Fifa's Jack Warner backs England on 2018 World Cup
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World Cup 2010: Warner - England 2018 bid 'back on track'
Fifa vice-president Jack Warner insists that England can still win the race to host the 2018 World Cup, despite the controversy surrounding Lord Triesman.
Triesman stepped down as England's bid chairman after reportedly accusing Spanish and Russian football federations of conspiring in bribery.
"It was inappropriate but those things are now behind us and I think England's bid is back on track," he told the BBC.
Acting FA chairman Roger Burden welcomed Warner's comments.
"Certainly that's the feedback I've been getting from South Africa," Burden told BBC Gloucestershire.
"I've had exchanges of correspondence from my colleagues out there and that's the news I am receiving from them. Our bid is a strong one."
Very few people on the Fifa executive committee are talking about it
BBC sports editor David Bond
Along with England, there are also bids in from Australia, Russia and the United States as well as joint bids from Belgium and the Netherlands and Portugal and Spain.
As head of the Concacaf union of North and Central American and Caribbean football associations, Warner's support is crucial to England's hopes.
He will effectively control three of the 24 votes on Fifa's executive committee when it chooses the 2018 hosts in December.
He had previously been critical of England's proposal, warning the bid team that they were falling behind rivals like Spain in the race to host the tournament.
However, during a meeting with then Prime Minister Gordon Brown in Trinidad last year he gave his support to the bid.
Triesman stood down as chairman of the Football Association as well as the 2018 Cup bid after what he called his "entrapment" by a newspaper in May.
The revelations came two days after the FA submitted its 1,752-page bid book to football's governing body Fifa.
But Warner believes that Triesman's swift resignation may have helped England's bid to recover momentum.
"The FA did it correctly, getting him to resign immediately, and there was not much damage done," Warner told BBC Sports Editor David Bond. "Very few people on the Fifa executive committee are talking about it.
"England's chances are as good as the other countries. England has the capacity and the capability to host a successful World Cup but I guess so do the other countries."
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