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Football Federation Australia (FFA) has promoted Rod Allen to head of media relations.

Allen, who joined the country’s World Cup bid team in November as a senior media adviser, replaces head of corporate and public affairs Bonita Mersiades, who quit unexpectedly after apparently becoming disillusioned with the direction of the campaign.

Allen – who worked as a journalist and management executive for 22 years with News Ltd and Fairfax Media – will be responsible for all aspects of FFA media, community and public relations, and the local media aspects of the World Cup bid. He will report directly to FFA chief Ben Buckley but will have less to do with government relations and domestic marketing and promotions than Mersiades.

Mersiades was hand-picked by FFA chairman Frank Lowy to be head of corporate and public affairs, but she is said to have clashed with some of the consultants employed by the FFA to bolster the bid’s global profile.

Buckley told World Football Insider that the sudden departure of such a senior member of the bid team would not hurt the country’s efforts to land the World Cup in 2018 or 2022.

"It will not impact on the bid at all and we are very comfortable with where we are with the bid right now,” he said.

“With the bid moving into the decisive phase this year, a lot of the co-ordination and event activity will occur offshore and we had already taken moves to shore up our resources overseas.

“Also we have some extremely capable people in Australia working now to continue the media momentum around the bid."

Meanwhile, the FFA has appointed London sport and communications consultancy company Square 1 Sports to help build the international profile of the bid.

And Joanna Burns, a founding partner of UK consultancy firm Alexander Ross, has been hired to manage overseas events and to co-ordinate the international communications and relations aspects of the bid from London.