Sepp Blatter tries to ban book of cartoons

FIFA president Sepp Blatter is going to court in his native Switzerland to ban the publication of a book of cartoons.

The book of satirical drawings is by Danish cartoonist (and former footballer) Olé Andersen, and it features a Blatter lookalike.

According to his lawyers, Blatter “has a good reputation and if the cartoons were published he would never be able to repair the damage.”

Clearly, his lawyers, unlike their aggrieved client, do have a sense of humour.

However the 77-year-old’s attempt to ban the book, entitled ‘The Platter Cartoons‘ has, somewhat inevitably,  served to draw more attention to it, with his legal campaign to ban it drawing widespread derision.

The court case was first revealed by Andrew Jennings on his Transparency in Sport blog. He writes:

“Many months ago I had the privilege of seeing some of the cartoons and I understand why Blatter hates them: their sin is not to take the emperor of world football as seriously as he takes himself.”

This is not the first time Blatter has gone to court to try and prevent the publishing of a book, Jennings’ own 2006 book ‘Foul! The secret world of Fifa: bribes, vote rigging and ticket scandals‘ was itself once subject to an injunction.

However the action was withdrawn within 24 hours after its publisher, HarperCollins, announced that it would challenge the court’s ruling.