The former British spy behind a dossier of embarrassing allegations about Donald Trump was reportedly hired by England's 2018 World Cup bid team.

Christopher Steele is believed to have been brought in by the Football Association in 2010 to dig up information on governing body Fifa.

Information about the bidding process, which was mired in controversy, was also passed on to the Federal Bureau of Investigation in the US, according to reports.

Read more: Ex-MI6 officer 'compiled Donald Trump dossier'

Investigators from the FBI's Eurasian organised crime squad met the ex-MI6 officer in London to discuss allegations of possible corruption in Fifa, according to emails seen by Reuters.

The team later opened an investigation that led to more than 35 people being charged with a number of offences including corruption.

Mr Steele has gone into hiding after being identified as the author of the report claiming Moscow held incriminating material on the US president-elect which it could use to blackmail him.

Former colleagues have taken the unusual step in the secretive world of speaking out publicly to defend the ex-intelligence officer, describing him as a "thorough" and "very professional".

Mr Steele, who runs London-based Orbis Business Intelligence Service, is said to have originally compiled the report for political opponents of Mr Trump in Washington.

Read more: Ex-MI6 officer 'compiled Donald Trump dossier'

Former British ambassador to Russia Sir Andrew Wood said he spoke to Republican senator John McCain at an international security conference in November about the existence of material that could compromise the president-elect.

Sir Andrew told The Independent: "Yes I did meet Senator McCain and his aides at the conference.

"The issue of Donald Trump and Russia was very much in the news and it was natural to talk about it. We spoke about the kind of activities the Russians can be engaged in.

"We also spoke about how Mr Trump may find himself in a position where there could be an attempt to blackmail him with Kompromat (the Russian term for compromising material) and claims that there were audio and video tapes in existence."

Read more: Ex-MI6 officer 'compiled Donald Trump dossier'

Sir Andrew, ambassador to Moscow between 1995 and 2000, denied having seen the dossier at the time of the meeting and added Mr Steele was "very professional and thorough".

Former MI6 officer Harry Ferguson told BBC Newsnight that Mr Steele was reliable.

"Chris was a strong, middle-ranking SIS (MI6) officer and I don't quite agree that this was a sub-par report," he said.

"It seems to me that Chris was careful, as to try and find as many sources as possible to back these stories up, but also to make it clear that these are stories, and that what this intelligence report has at the moment is that it lacks that killer evidence."

But Sir Tony Brenton, a former British ambassador to Russia, described the dossier as "pretty shaky".

He told Sky News: "For example, it claims that the Russians began to cultivate Donald Trump five years ago.

"If they did that they showed remarkable prescience because at the time he had nothing to do with American politics."

Downing Street refused to be drawn on whether the Government had offered any assistance to Mr Steele, who was reported to be in fear for his life after being named in media reports.