Thai football official denies corruption forced national coach Robson out

BANGKOK—The fallout from corruption allegations involving Thailand’s senior football official had nothing to do with Bryan Robson quitting suddenly as national coach, according to the man at the center of the accusations.

Former Manchester United captain Robson, who earlier this year underwent successful treatment on throat cancer, quit Wednesday without publicly giving a reason.

Football Association of Thailand chief Worawi Makudi, accused by former English Football Association chief David Triesman of demanding the television rights to a proposed Thailand-England friendly in exchange for voting for England in its unsuccessful bid to host the 2018 World Cup, told local media that he wasn’t involved in Robson’s decision.

“It is Robson’s own decision. It has nothing to do with Lord Triesman’s allegations against me,” Worawi was quoted as saying in Thursday’s edition of the Bangkok Post newspaper.

Assistant coach Steve Darby had earlier written in an e-mail to The Associated Press that he and Robson had left with “mutual consent.”

Thailand struggled after Robson replaced his former England teammate Peter Reid as coach in September 2009, failing to reach the Asian Cup finals earlier this year and being eliminated at the group stage in the Southeast Asian regional championship.

Worawi had also been the focus of anger among fans for Thailand’s poor performance, compounded by the under-23 team being expelled from Olympic qualifiers for fielding an ineligible player and an unresolved dispute over the legitimacy of Worawi postponing the election for the presidency of the Football Association of Thailand.

Worawi, who is a long-standing member of FIFA’s executive committee, has denied the corruption allegations.

Meanwhile, Worawi’s close ally Mohammad bin Hammam was also caught up in a major bribery scandal, accused of offering bribes to Caribbean football officials in return for votes for his ultimately abandoned campaign to become FIFA president.

Worawi had declared he would vote for bin Hammam before the Qatari dropped his campaign on the eve of the vote, amid the eruption of FIFA’s broadening corruption scandal.