With FIFA finally being brought to book for the systemic corruption that has not so much long been suspected as taken for granted, it is worth considering how its officials have got away with it for so long?

In examining that there is irony in that much of the evidence has been gathered by an organisation owned by another old man who has been demonised in the rest of the British media, which was also responsible for the journalism that brought to an end sport's previous biggest scandal.

Whether bringing down Lance Armstrong and Sepp Blatter will transform how most regard Rupert Murdoch remains to be seen, but the media mogul's image, juxtaposed with his contribution in this matter, should caution us against the tendency to cast individuals as out-and-out goodies or baddies.

So to how Blatter has not only repeatedly gained re-election as FIFA President and did so once again, while all around him were being arrested by the FBI.

This is where the role played by the English media - not to mention its royal family - is, I would suggest, counter-productive because of how a skilled politician such as Blatter could use it to advantage.

Jokes may be made about the Swiss and the fact that their creativity does not extend beyond the creation of cuckoo clocks (conveniently ignoring the glitterati clamour to be seen wearing their blingiest chronometers), but for European administrators seeking high office in international organisations there could be many worse countries from which to emerge than that which is so determinedly neutral.

In the recent FIFA presidential election two candidates withdrew just a week or so in advance, one of whom, Luis Figo, was pretty much a global brand in his playing days.

The great striker is from Portugal, the other to withdraw is from Holland, another of the old colonial European powers which brutally pillaged the planet, incarcerating its citizens as unpaid labour and play-things.

That the Americans, relatively recently converted to soccer, are now behaving as the world's police once more will meanwhile only reinforce resentment in some quarters and if you think relating long-standing national antagonism fanciful in such matters consider the frivolousness of the Eurovision song contest and how ridiculously political its voting has famously been.

More directly relevant, though, is that until Blatter first won the FIFA presidency seventeen years ago no fewer than none of 16 World Cup finals had taken place outside Europe and the Americas, setting the scene for his courtship of the rest of the world.

As with matters such as rules on global warming it is very easy to portray the rich, western world as having reached a stage of advancement with which it is comfortable and as now introducing measures to prevent others from catching up.

In among FIFA representatives from around the rest of the world who, if our own blazer-wearers are anything to go by will be some of the most pompous citizens of their respective nations, Blatter needed only to throw his hands up in the air and say: "Look, the English and Americans are telling you what to do again..."

To that end the English media has spent much of the last week focusing on how unfair it was that England and America did not win the right to stage the 2018 and 2022 tournaments and whether they could yet do so, while showing relatively little interest in just how the English FA spent some £20 million on its World Cup bid.

It was, then, frustrating to tune into the radio last weekend to hear a Scottish pundit trot out the propaganda that England, a pinprick on the global map which staged the finals just 13 tournaments ago - there are more than 200 countries affiliated to FIFA - somehow "deserves" to stage the tournament. He meanwhile reasserted that Qatar should not be allowed to do so because people cannot legally buy alcohol and it is too hot.

Setting aside the apparent dependence hereabouts on booze for enjoyment, on the question of temperature I remember some 25 years ago a Fijian rugby coach, one November Friday, explaining how his players were unlikely to exhibit their fabled skills at Murrayfield that weekend because they could not feel their long, slender fingers in the Scottish cold.

For by no means the first time our bard's call to us to consider how other see us springs to mind, given how intent we appear to be on feathering our own nests while accusing others of doing so.

Personally I see all sorts of maladministration in sport much closer to home than FIFA, but without massive resources it is very difficult to prove.

As things stand there is a serious danger of a sanctimonious west being perceived as telling the rest of the world that only our form of corruption - consider how few American and British bankers have been brought to book in criminal courts - is acceptable.

Blatter and FIFA may deserve to be brought down but the media and the authorities should not be stopping there.