Tired of waiting for soccer's governing body to fall into line, anti-doping chiefs will this weekend rule on whether FIFA has "properly and thoroughly" adopted the World Anti-Doping Code.
Should WADA decide FIFA has not adopted the code, it could lead to a major rift in world sport and even spill over into next year's World Cup finals in Germany.
The World Anti-Doping Agency's executive committee will thrash out the issue at its meeting in Montreal on Sunday, WADA president Richard Pound said on Thursday.
Central to the issue is the fact that WADA calls for a mandatory two-year ban for athletes found doping. FIFA has continued to impose lesser bans and advocates "individual case management".
"We're not satisfied that FIFA has properly and thoroughly adopted the code," Pound said.
"We have been in constant discussion with them and each time we have had this discussion they assure us they are going to change their rules to make them compliant.
"The last batch we got was just a few days ago and still they are not compliant so we are going to have to bring this to the attention of our executive committee and it is not impossible that the executive committee could be prepared to rule that FIFA is non-compliant with the code."
Pound said that ruling could trigger a whole rash of possible consequences "including with the German government with regards to the World Cup next year".
UNANIMOUS APPROVAL
Under the World Anti-Doping Code, governments which sign up -- including Germany -- must ensure that any world championships held on their soil comply with the code.
"We have done our best to bring them to the table," Pound said in a teleconference from Montreal.
"We just haven't managed to get them to understand that their rules don't comply. Their six-month rule is clearly non-compliant."
Pound said that each time he had discussed the matter with Sepp Blatter, the FIFA head had fully understood the problem and the need for making their rules code-compliant.
"We went through the FIFA congress last year and there was unanimous approval by the congress to adopt and implement the code but what has fallen between the cracks now are changes to the FIFA doping regulations to make them compliant in all respects with the code," Pound said.
"We've given them a how-to manual saying 'here's what you need to do'.
"I think the chances are very good that with the encouragement of all the stakeholders of WADA, FIFA will become fully code-compliant and that's important for everybody because FIFA is such an important international federation."
FIFA were not immediately available for comment.
Established in November 1999, WADA was set up as a foundation from an IOC initiative with the support of inter-governmental organisations, governments, public authorities and other public and private bodies also fighting against doping in sport.
The agency, consisting of equal representatives from the Olympic movement and public authorities, received its first two years of funding solely from the Olympic movement.
From January 1 2002, WADA's funding has been sourced equally from the Olympic movement and the governments of the world.
