Paris (France) (AFP) – FIFA president Gianni Infantino's close relationship with Donald Trump has ensured a successful World Cup and all eyes will be on IOC president Kirsty Coventry to see if she adopts a similar strategy ahead of the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics.
Issued on: 16/07/2026 - 09:24
3 min Reading time
Until now it has been Casey Wasserman, chairman of the LA28 organising committee, and his team who have been dealing with the US administration.Coventry, the former Zimbabwean swimmer has been in charge for just over a year, is yet to meet Trump."Wasserman's team's mandate is to deliver the Games, protect the revenue, and 'make the trains run on time'," Terrence Burns, a former IOC marketing executive, told AFP."President Coventry's mandate is to protect universality and the integrity of sport."Those two things run in parallel right up to the moment they don't, and the moment they don't is when relationships, not only contracts, matter."Chief among Coventry's priorities is ensuring safe entry for the thousands of athletes who will compete at the Games.In terms of numbers the World Cup is miniscule compared to the Olympics -- 11,200 athletes, or 15,000 if you include the Paralympics, as opposed to 1,200 -- but the US refused entry to FIFA-accredited Somali referee Omar Artan and also blocked some of the Iranian entourage."Managing the political dynamics counting down to LA 28 is arguably President Coventry's biggest challenge," Michael Payne, a former head of marketing for the IOC who is well-informed on Olympic matters, told AFP."It is totally naïve to think that you can have the whole world turn up without a strong engagement with the political authorities," he added."Failure by the IOC leadership not to properly engage with the global political establishment is a recipe for disaster."It is one thing dealing with the political establishment and quite another dealing with the maverick that is Trump.Asked last year about how she intended to deal with Trump, Coventry said: "I have been dealing with, let's say, difficult men in high positions since I was 20 years old."Burns, though, said: "Nobody handles him. The question is whether the IOC has a strategy that does not depend on personal chemistry."This means a private channel with a respected relationship, and hopefully where no public statement demands a public response."'Pragmatic'
