Football Federation Australia chairman Frank Lowy says he should have known his nation’s bid to host the 2022 World Cup was doomed because of the world game’s dirty politics.

Lowy said Australia’s $46-million bid, which received just one vote of support in a process unexpectedly won by Qatar, was clean of bribes and corruption but never stood a chance of winning.

“I have nightmares about all the work we did. And we didn’t get anywhere,” Mr Lowy told Sky News in an interview broadcast on Tuesday.

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“You just got to get on with it. I take the responsibility and I take the blame. I should have known better.

“Had I known that we had less than 50 per cent of a chance, I probably wouldn’t have been there.”

The bidding process for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups is being freshly investigated by Swiss authorities amid a wider corruption scandal enveloping football’s world governing body, FIFA.

FIFA president Sepp Blatter will stand down from his role, despite winning re-election at a FIFA Congress.

Seven FIFA officials were arrested in a dawn raid at a Zurich hotel before the Congress, part of 14 people charged by United States authorities.

The US allege the 14 people – current and former FIFA officials and sports marketeers – conspired to solicit and receive more than $US150 million ($A194 million) in bribes and kickbacks, in exchange for their support of marketing executives who agreed to make the illegal payments.

Mr Lowy said last week in a statement the Australian money was paid to CONCACAF but it was ultimately found that Warner “had committed fraud and misappropriated the funds – in other words he had stolen the money from CONCACAF”.

“There were no bribes in this process,” Mr Lowy said.

He said the Australian money paid to Warner was not part of a corrupt process.

“I have no concerns about that,” Mr Lowy said.

“The money wasn’t sent or given to Warner, it was a cheque transferred to CONCACAF.

“Today is a major event because it was found out that Warner pocketed that money. But he took that money not from us, but took the money away from CONCACAF.

“I became aware a year, maybe 18 months, after the event, that he pocketed that money.”

Xenophon still has questions

“There are more questions to answer,” Independent Senator Nick Xenophon told Sky News.

“It concerns me that something like close to $15 million of that (taxpayers cash) went to three individuals.

“When it became painfully apparent that ($500,000 payment to Jack Warner) was not being used for upgrades on sports facilities in Trinidad & Tobago, but instead appears to have lined Jack Warner’s pockets, why did the FFA not report the matter to the AFP?”

Mr Xenophon said that Mr Lowy’s claims that the $500,000 payment went on among a lot of alleged fraud from other countries and FIFA members, didn’t make Australia’s conduct ok.

“We need to have a Senate inquiry into this … we need to look at broader issues of corporate governance and issues of foreign bribery and corruption,” he said.

“If you give money for a particular purpose and that money is used for a different purpose … surely that would set off the alarm bells.”