Those who have Twitter would have heard the results of the winners of the World Cup bids before the official announcement. Who did not want to believe it until we saw Sepp Blatter hold the card up showing the winner?
I think that is what took many by surprise because what was basically already leaked on Twitter proved to be correct. That was the first indication that something did not seem right. So it must also be true when people announced that Qatar had already won an hour before the official announcement.
The second indication was the amount of votes countries like England and Australia received, after being promised more, which meant they didn’t pass the first round. Maybe our bid team was naive to think that ticking all the boxes was enough to secure a World Cup. Obviously FIFA operates differently and they needed ‘more’ than ticking all the boxes.
Sepp Blatter has emphasised before that he wants to take the World Cup to unknown territory. He is also trying to chase a Noble Piece Prize for that achievement. Knowing that, then really the only countries that should have made a bid for the World Cup is Russia, Qatar and Australia. Then again, if Australia is considered Asia, we should have not bothered either.
The words corruption and FIFA in the same sentence is nothing new. Many articles have been published previously criticising the way FIFA operates. There was that time when the G14 (a group consisting of the most powerful clubs in Europe) was formed in September 2000 aimed at reducing the power FIFA had on football. They have since disbanded, but have formed the European Club Association. However, with FIFA currently consisting of 208 members, it indicates that countries are still willing to go along with FIFA’s ways of doing things.
But for how long?
There have been calls already to create a new international football body. England does have the strongest football league and if they wanted to start one, I am sure they would receive backing. From memory, the USA were not happy with the result either. Has anyone spoken to Rupert Murdoch lately?
Holding the decision of 2018 and 2022 World Cup hosts at the same time has not done any favours in terms of FIFA’s reputation. Instead of one surprise we had two. Frank Lowy humbly accepted defeat and was not willing to say anything negative about FIFA. The Australian media have expressed their disappointment and anger. As for England, they are not going keep quiet. It has been well known that British media are notorious when it comes to bringing people down. The Sun newspaper has already named and shamed the seven executive members that lied to the England bid team. Personally, I would just want to know who the one vote for Australia was from.
Maybe in a week or so the shock of the result will be forgotten. But for some reason I get the impression that FIFA’s problems have just begun.
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