by Our Sports Desk

FIFA’s executive committee were urged yesterday to discuss postponing the presidential election at an emergency meeting following the crisis that has struck the world governing body.

Several Fifa ExCo members including England’s David Gill, Germany’s Wolfgang Niersbach and Belgium’s Michel D’Hooghe are pushing for an emergency meeting to take place and it is likely to be held the week after next in Zurich.

The calls for the emergency meeting come after Sepp Blatter and Michel Platini were both provisionally banned for 90 days by Fifa’s ethics committee.

It is understood that the presidential election, due to be held on February 26, would be top of the agenda. It is also likely to be raised at a meeting of Uefa’s 54 member associations which has been called for next Thursday in Nyon, Switzerland — Uefa president Platini filed his nomination papers to run for the presidency just hours before his suspension and postponing the election would help his cause.

D’Hooghe, the longest-serving member of the Fifa ExCo, said: “I am one of the members asking for an emergency meeting of the Fifa ExCo. At the moment I have no information about an eventual postponing of the election but perhaps this point could be discussed there.”

Gill has contacted Fifa’s acting secretary-general Markus Kattner about calling a meeting and talks are also taking place with Issa Hayatou, the head of African football who is acting president while Blatter is suspended.

The deadline for nominations for candidates for the Fifa presidency is due to end on October 26. Ali bin al-Hussein of Jordan is also planning to run and it is understood Asian football chief Salman bin Ebrahim al-Khalifa from Bahrain is pondering whether to run himself, as is Kuwait’s Ahmad al Fahad al Sabah, another Fifa ExCo member.

Platini has insisted he is determined to maintain his challenge for the Fifa presidency but the ethics committee provisional ban stands in his way — and he will also have to pass an ethics committee integrity check.

The Frenchman has lodged an appeal against the ban, as has Blatter, who was relieved of his duties as Fifa president on Thursday.

Klaus Stohlker, Blatter’s friend and adviser, said: “He has appealed already to Fifa’s appeal committee. He is defending his position and he is sure that he will be found not guilty.”

Platini has also announced he will challenge the ban and both cases will now go to the Fifa appeals committee.

Football Association chairman Greg Dyke has said the governing body will drop its support for Platini if the ethics committee decides there has been wrongdoing.