NEW YORK — The American member of FIFA’s executive committee says politics came into play in the votes to have Russia and Qatar host the World Cup and that soccer’s governing body must reconsider how it decides future tournament sites.

Chuck Blazer said that because FIFA is unlikely to choose the 2026 host for eight years, it should consider changes well before it’s time to vote again.

A supporter of the failed U.S. bid for 2022, Blazer said he thinks the North and Central American and Caribbean confederation was the biggest loser in the decision to end FIFA’s policy of rotating World Cup hosts among the continents.

“The shame of all of it is under the rotation system, clearly ‘18 would have been ours, and we gave way to lifting that system in order to provide Europe with a good opportunity and FIFA to have another European World Cup in between,” he said Friday from Zurich in a telephone interview with The Associated Press.

FIFA adopted a continental rotation system in August 2000, three weeks after Germany defeated South Africa 12-11 in the vote for 2006 World Cup host. It was scrapped in October 2007 over CONCACAF’s objection, a day before Brazil was unanimously elected the 2014 host — it was the only bidder.

CONCACAF has not hosted a World Cup since the 1994 tournament in the United States.

“I’ve got to think in the end that having moved away from what had been agreed to as the rotation, that we ended up with the short end of that stick as a confederation,” said Blazer, the No. 2 official in CONCACAF.

With eight of the 24 executive committee votes, Europe wound up as the only continent competing for 2018 as others did the math months in advance and withdrew. Russia won Thursday’s balloting over England, Spain-Portugal and Netherlands-Belgium.

Qatar won 2022, beating the United States 14-8 in the final round after Australia, Japan and South Korea were eliminated.

England and the United States were considered the best prospects for technically successful and profitable tournaments, yet those evaluations appeared to matter little in the voting. FIFA instead opted for the grand design projects of Russia and Qatar, sending the World Cup to Eastern Europe and the Middle East for the first time.

This follows this year’s World Cup in South Africa, the first to be held on the African continent.

The U.S. has not said whether or not it will bid for 2026.