Banned Platini withdraws bid for FIFA presidency

Suspended UEFA president Michel Platini has withdrawn his name from the race of becoming the next FIFA president, saying that he is dedicating himself towards clearing his name.

Speaking on his decision, Platini said that he didn't have time to go to the voters and ask for their votes, insisting that it would be difficult to fight against other candidates.

According to Sport24, Platini said that he would fight for himself and would concentrate his resources on appealing to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) and the FIFA electoral commission.

Platini, along with his FIFA counterpart Sepp Blatter, have been serving an eight-year ban from all football-related activities over claims that the former had received a ' disloyal payment ' of 1.35 million pounds from the outgoing president in 2011.

The 60-year-old, who was still struggling to understand his suspension from all football-related activities, insisted that there was nothing illegal in his oral contract.

In addition to the lengthy bans, Blatter and Platini have also been fined 50,000 and 80,000 Swiss francs respectively.

With Platini's withdrawal, five candidates are now left in the race for the election namely Prince Ali bin al-Hussein of Jordan, the UEFA general secretary Gianni Infantino, Asian Football Confederation president Sheikh Salman, former diplomat Jerome Champagne and South African businessman Tokyo Sexwale.