The independent Congress Review Working Group – ordered to be set up by FIFA to bring the FFA board into line – spent six months talking to interested parties in Australian football.

It released its report last month which included a radical overhaul of the FFA board and congress structure, and spinning off the A-League to be its own organisation.

The FFA immediately opposed the recommendations and chairman Steven Lowy threatened to stand down if members backed the proposal.

Football Federation Victoria – one of the congress members backing the changes and rebelling against the FFA position – called an extraordinary general meeting for Tuesday to vote on the proposals.

But late on Friday, just before the long weekend holiday, the FFA sent out a lengthy statement to all members of the congress, recommending they vote against the proposed changes.

They insist that the FFA does back some of the recommendations but not all, and have asked the members to reject the resolution seeking approval for the CRWG proposals.

Instead, the FFA wants even more time to discuss possible changes – after three long years of never-ending discussion since this was first raised.

However the fear is that if the FFA is successful in blocking the proposed changes, FIFA will finally lose patience with Australian football and this long-running saga.

They could order the FFA executive group is sacked and install a normalisation committee while change is pushed through regardless.

Or they could simply suspend the FFA from FIFA until they accept the changes proposed.

The group of rebels - which includes A-League clubs bosses, led by Melbourne City, the players' union PFA plus NPL clubs, fans and the larger state federations – believe the CRWG was effectively FIFA's normalisation committee step in the process.

And they believe the next response from FIFA will simply be suspension – putting Australia's defence of the Asian Cup in jeopardy next January, and the Matildas' spot at the 2019 Women's World Cup.

The FFA however are desperately trying to cling to power over the A-League, and only cherrypick the reforms that they want which will specifically limit the influence of A-League clubs, players and special interest groups like fans.

In exchange, they have offered to "immediately work with members and FIFA and the AFC on a model that retains the core elements of the CRWG model, complies with FIFA statutes and reflects the appropriate Congress balance for football in Australia."

They insist they can still come up with an agreement in time for the annual general meeting later this year.

The extraordinary general meeting called by FFV will be held at FFA HQ in Sydney on Tuesday, starting at 2pm.