Kearns' (pictured top) exit leaves three remaining candidates in Australia's Asian Football Confederation (AFC) vice-president Moya Dodd, Burundi Football Association President and International Olympic Committee (IOC) member Lydia Nsekera and Turks and Caicos Islands Football Association secretary general Sonia Bien-Aime.

Nsekera, 46, who has held an Executive Committee position on an interim mandate since May 2012, is the current forerunner to claim the full time position - which will give a woman voting rights for the first time in FIFA's 109-year history, but 48-year-old former player Dodd, who has the backing of Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard, presents a considerable challenge for the four-year seat.


Bien-Aime was one of the few Caribbean officials to emerge from the bribery scandal, which saw Qatar's Mohamed Bin Hammam and Trinidad and Tobago's Jack Warner lose their senior positions within FIFA, with her reputation intact after she testified to the Ethics Committee that she had turned down a cash "gift" for attending a meeting arranged by the pair in 2011 when Bin Hammam was challenging Sepp Blatter for the Presidency of FIFA.

It was Blatter who decided to place a woman at the top level of football administration as part of world football's governing body's reform process, however, the 77-year-old Swiss somewhat undermined his initiative when he called Dodd "good, and good looking" in an address to AFC delegates at a Conference.

While her embarrassment was obvious in her facial expression, Dodd was keen to brush aside the comment saying she was, "mainly focused on hearing [Blatter's] comments about me being a good candidate".

"If he said anything more, then thanks for that, too," she added.

She also insisted that she will not be a token appointment if she is elected.

"This position is a great opportunity for a woman to make a definitive contribution at the highest level," Dodd said.

"If you want to be a token presence, then that's what it'll be.

"If you want to be actively engaged in the best interests of the game, to work with your colleagues from around the world, then that is a great opportunity."


The comment was just the latest in a long list of gaffes made by Blatter, who once suggested that female footballers should wear skimpier kits.

"Let the women play in more feminine clothes like they do in volleyball," he said in 2004.

"They could, for example, have tighter shorts.

"Female players are pretty, if you excuse me for saying so, and they already have some different rules to men – such as playing with a lighter ball.

"That decision was taken to create a more female aesthetic, so why not do it in fashion?"

The first female FIFA Executive Committee member is due to be announced tomorrow.

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