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Australia embarrassed as FIFA steps in to resolve dispute

Melbourne, Australia: Australian football faces an embarrassing intervention this week as a joint FIFA-Asian Football Confederation delegation arrives for talks aimed at ending a bitter power struggle that has plunged the domestic game into crisis.

The governing Football Federation Australia (FFA) has been at loggerheads with the country's 10 professional A-League clubs, and come under pressure from FIFA, to expand membership of its 10-member Congress into a more democratic model.

The Congress, which elects the FFA board, has representatives of the country's nine states and territories but just one delegate for all 10 clubs in the top-flight A-League and none representing the players.

The FFA have proposed a 13-member Congress, offering two additional votes to the clubs and one for the players, but this has been rejected by both the clubs and FIFA.

The clubs, who say they generate 80 percent of revenues for football in Australia, want at least five seats but the FFA, led by chairman Steven Lowy and CEO David Gallop, have dug their heels in.

Lowy has been vocal about his distrust of the clubs' intentions and, like his billionaire father Frank Lowy, who was chairman before him, has rejected calls to allow an independent commission run the A-League.

"Club owners have made no secret of their demands for more power, and more money. They seek an independent league, run by them for their benefit," he said in a 2,000-word communique addressed to the 'Australian football community' over the weekend.

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