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Japan has abandoned its bid to host the 2018 football World Cup and will instead focus on its campaign for the 2022 tournament, the country’s soccer chief said Tuesday.
The sport’s world and European governing bodies, FIFA and UEFA, have “strong intentions to bring the 2018 edition to Europe no matter what”, Japan Football Association president Motoaki Inukai said, announcing the decision.
“Japan has asked them to support Japan in its 2022 bid after Japan gives up 2018,” Inukai, who also heads Japan’s World Cup bid committee, told reporters.
The committee approved the idea at its meeting on Tuesday, added the FA chief, who has recently toured South America and Europe and met with FIFA president Sepp Blatter in Zurich.
Football’s world governing body will choose the hosts of both the 2018 and 2022 tournaments in December.
Apart from Japan, England, Russia, Australia and the United States are planning to bid for the 2018 event, while there are also joint bids by Spain/Portugal and Netherlands/Belgium.
Australia and the United States are also seeking to host the 2022 event in competition with Qatar, South Korea and now Japan.
Japan, which co-hosted the 2002 World Cup with neighbouring South Korea, would on Friday present a plan to FIFA outlining the 13 stadiums it would use, should it win the right to the 2022 event, he said.
They include a new 80,000-seater stadium to be built in Osaka.
FIFA requires World Cup hosts to have around 12 stadiums with more than 40,000 seats, and at least one with more than 80,000.
Japan’s largest venue at present, the International Stadium in Yokohama, has a capacity of only 72,000.
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