The football administrator's disclosures sparked investigations that eventually toppled FIFA boss Sepp Blatter.
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The disgraced US football executive Chuck Blazer, banned for life by FIFA, has died aged 72. He was at the centre of investigations that led to the overhaul of the sport’s global management.
In 2013 when he pleaded guilty to tax evasion and corruption charges, he disclosed he had cancer, diabetes and heart disease.
Blazer spent more than two decades at the top of the sport, between 1990-2011 as number two at CONCACAF – football’s governing body for North and Central America and the Caribbean – and between 1997-2013 he was a member of FIFA’s ruling executive committee.
The information he provided eventually toppled FIFA President Sepp Blatter. But Blazer himself misused the sport’s funds to finance a flamboyant personal lifestyle: his cats famously had exclusive use of one of his New York apartments.
Despite his excesses, the American national team coach Bruce Arena said Blazer did a lot for football in US and was a “good man”.
FIFA whistleblower Chuck Blazer dies / per Reutershttps://t.co/JiomzQ4CIK pic.twitter.com/nLBJVCW8HD
— changeFIFA (@changeFIFA) July 13, 2017