Serge Vittoz told a news conference: “The decision will be taken on Oct 30 and most likely notified to the parties either the same day or a few days later.”

Vittoz, an international sports lawyer with a firm based in Geneva and London, said FAM would still have the option to appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport should the outcome be unfavourable.

However, the arbitration appeal “will take some time to be resolved”.

Vittoz said the primary goal of the Fifa appeal is to protect the players and demonstrate that FAM had no involvement in any alleged document forgery related to the heritage players’ eligibility.

“The second objective is to make Fifa understand that FAM as an institution didn’t have any implication on any forgery, which is the violation put forward by Fifa,” he said.

Last month, Fifa’s disciplinary committee penalised FAM and seven naturalised players – Gabriel Felipe Arrocha, Facundo Garces, Rodrigo Holgado, Imanol Machuca, Joao Figueiredo, Jon Irazabal and Hector Hevel – after they were found guilty of violating the Fifa disciplinary code related to document falsification.

The international federation said FAM had submitted falsified documents to confirm the eligibility of the players, allowing them to compete in the third-round match of the 2027 Asian Cup qualifiers against Vietnam on June 10.

As a result, FAM was fined 350,000 Swiss francs (about RM1.8 million), while each player was fined 2,000 francs (about RM10,560) and suspended for 12 months from all football-related activities from the date of notification of the decision.

FAM has previously stated that a technical error by an administrative staff member occurred in the submission of documents for the seven players.