UEFA elect Michel Platini’s successor

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Michael van Praag (l) lost to Aleksander Ceferin (r) in the election. Credit: AP

UEFA has elected Slovenian FA head Aleksander Ceferin as its new president.

‘It is a great honour, but also a great responsibility, it means a lot to me. My small and beautiful Slovenia is very proud of it, and I hope that one day you will also be proud of me’, he said as takes on the remainder of Michel Platini‘s term of office, until 2019.

Ceferin becomes the seventh UEFA president. Credit: Paul MurphyUefa via Getty Images

Ceferin got 42 votes at UEFA’s congress in Athens, 29 more than Dutchman Michael van Praag, to succeed Michel Platini, who resigned last year.

Platini was banned from all football activities in 2015 for breaching ethics rules over a £1.3m ‘disloyal payment’ made to him in 2011 by then FIFA president Sepp Blatter, who was also banned from all football activities.

Sepp Blatter and Michel Platini banned from football activities. Photo: Sky

The duo were handed eight-year bans, later reduced to six years on appeal to FIFA, then to four years in a further appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport.

Ceferin becomes the seventh UEFA president.

Former presidents include, Platini, Lennart Johansson, Jacques Georges, Artemio Franchi, Gustav Wiederkehr and Ebbe Schwartz.

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