Gianni Infantino has spent a decade as one of the most scrutinised figures in world sport. His wife has spent the same decade making sure almost none of that scrutiny lands on her. Leena Al Ashqar is Lebanese, has been married to the FIFA president since 2001, and has built one of the most genuinely private profiles of any spouse connected to a major global sporting figure.
How Leena Al Ashqar Met Gianni Infantino
The most consistently reported version of their story traces back to the Lebanese Football Federation, where Al Ashqar worked in an administrative and event-planning capacity in the early 2000s. Infantino, then a lawyer working at UEFA, crossed paths with her through football’s governing structures, and the connection turned personal over time. They married in 2001 and settled first in Brig, Switzerland, Infantino’s hometown.
What Is Actually Known About Her Life
Reports differ on Al Ashqar’s exact birth year, with some placing it in the early 1970s and others in the late 1970s, and her precise nationality at birth is also reported inconsistently, with some sources describing her as Lebanese-born and others as Swiss-born to a Lebanese family. What is consistent across reporting is that she holds Lebanese heritage, practises Islam, and has largely avoided any media engagement or public statements throughout her husband’s FIFA presidency.
She and Infantino have four daughters: Shania Serena, Alessia, Dhalia Nora and Sabrina. Their youngest, Dhalia Nora, reportedly fell ill during the 2018 World Cup in Russia, one of the rare personal details that has surfaced publicly about the family. The Infantinos relocated to Doha, Qatar, around 2021, with some reports linking Al Ashqar to administrative or executive work with companies based there, though none of these claims have been independently confirmed.
A Public Role Without a Public Voice
Al Ashqar appears occasionally at major FIFA events, including the 2026 World Cup draw at the Kennedy Center in Washington DC in December 2025 and the FIFA Club World Cup final in New Jersey in July 2025, where she was photographed seated near world leaders. She keeps no public social media accounts and has never given an interview. For a man who runs the most powerful governing body in sport and rarely shies away from a camera, his wife has spent over two decades doing the exact opposite, and by every indication, that is precisely how she wants it.