Vitaly Mutko, the embattled head of the 2018 World Cup organising committee, has agreed to step down after being cited repeatedly in a series of reports exposing the country’s systematic doping regime.

Mutko will be replaced by Alexei Sorokin, who is Russia 2018 chief executive and the man who took his place on the Fifa council. It reduces the pressure on football’s world governing body, which had been urged to remove Mutko from his role at Russia 2018 in the light of overwhelming evidence to suggest he was not fit to occupy the position.

Mutko’s impending departure follows the announcement this week that he would be temporarily stepping down from another role as head of the Russia football union, the equivalent of the FA, after a crisis meeting.

Mutko had been under pressure to relinquish his two jobs around Russia 2018 after the International Olympic Committee banned him from involvement with the Olympics for life for his role in widespread doping in the country and the resultant cover-up.

At an hour-long press conference before the World Cup draw this month, Mutko held court alongside the Fifa president, Gianni Infantino, and proceedings were dominated by questions of Russian doping. It was embarrassing for football’s governing body but Mutko remained resolute, instead taking aim at his critics. He insisted there was “no proof” cheating took place on an unprecedented scale. It is not clear whether Mutko’s public defiance resulted in increased pressure on him from Fifa to resign but the 59-year-old has provoked international outrage with his staunch defence of Russian sport throughout the doping scandal.

A report by the former Switzerland president Samuel Schmid confirmed there had been “systemic manipulation” of anti-doping results at the Sochi Winter Olympics in 2014, and elsewhere, by the Russian state. They were found to have manipulating drug testing procedures by replacing “dirty” test tube samples with “clean” ones. It resulted in the IOC taking the unprecedented step of banning the Russian team from the 2018 Winter Olympics, to be held in South Korea in February.

Grigory Rodchenkov, a former head of the Moscow anti-doping laboratory turned whistleblower, detailed dozens of meetings with Mutko in a 52-page affidavit submitted to Schmid. It was concluded that as the Russian sport minister at the time the doping scheme unfolded, Mutko had the ultimate administrative responsibility for the acts perpetrated.

Fifa said it would “continue to work in close collaboration” with the new leadership “with the aim to deliver an exceptional event in June and July” and also said it “thanks Mr Mutko for his invaluable contribution to the preparations”.

Mutko has vehemently denied any state-sponsored doping. “I’m happy to go to any court, to any disciplinary committee, to anyone, and I’ll be happy to talk about how there has never been and will never be any state programs related to doping in this country,” he said.

The World Cup begins on 1 June next year with Russia playing Saudi Arabia in the opening game at Moscow’s Luzhniki Stadium. All anti-doping samples will be handled outside the country.