Sepp Blatter’s recent assertion during the recent AFC that Australia would one day host a good World Cup was at best a back handed compliment. One that fired up more than a handful of Australian football fans still wondering what happened in December 2010.
You could argue that the $45 million last seen funnelling down a tunnel could have been better used had we known the extent of the murky deadlines afoot. A degree of naivety was at play, sure, but the brazen manner in which FIFA conducted the bidding process makes the rugby league scrum look almost transparent.
That’s past. Is it? The decision, seemingly a unilateral one, to host the 2022 World Cup in November/December only intensifies the ire football fans feel world wide about the initial decision to award the World Cup to Qatar in the first place.
If countries were bidding to host the tournament at the traditional mid season period of June/July, why is the host nation permitted to stage it just before the halfway mark of the European season?
Qatar promised never seen before technology, mass comfort air conditioning, fake clouds and other measures to ensure player, official and fan comfort during the summer tournament, brushing aside concerns of playing in 40-45 degree temperatures.
Who can forget the matt silver models of first class comfort stadia during the bidding process?
All now a sham, and the fears that it would be awarded to the gulf nation only to be moved to winter now realised. FIFA, Sepp Blatter and Jerome Valcke will care little as they are already sufficiently coated in the spittle of derision and scorn from a long list of illogical and embarrassing decisions. What’s one more act of deceit?
The logistical fixture nightmares alone will cause the European league officials to tear their hair out. The UEFA Champions League will be shoehorned into a shorter space of time and chaos will generally ensue.
Significant consideration will also need to be given to player welfare. Players selected in national squads won’t have the traditional 25-day training period before the tournament and players not selected will be twiddling their thumbs and generally losing match fitness.
It has become clear that a Venn diagram of the union between the IOC and FIFA executive reveals a few members with interest in both camps, including Sepp Blatter himself.
So why not a 2023 World Cup? FIFA claims this raises legal issues without explaining what these might be while we simultaneously snigger and eye roll at the thought of FIFA feeling encumbered by any law other than its own.
In response to the suggestion that FIFA may be forced to pay compensation too clubs and leagues for the decision, Valcke replied:
“It’s not perfect, we know that — but why are we talking about compensation? It’s happening once, we’re not destroying football.”
Not perfect. You don’t say.
Football is beautiful game run by an ugly governing body.
I would rather FIFA not stage the 2022 World Cup than have it run by the marriage of the Qatar Organising Committee and FIFA.
For a football tragic such as myself, that takes some saying.
Justin Mahon
Guest
There was no $45 for grass roots football or 18% of an AAMI Park scale stadium. There was only $45m for a World Cup bid expected to return many more times that in direct foreign investment, employment and retail sales. We spent it and lost. I don't like it, but I certainly don't kid myself it was available for any other purpose.
BtoThePower3
Guest
Boycott this 2022 Qatar World Cup.
Hamish Alcorn
Guest
This is very serious. FIFA have presented every football fan and player with an impossible ethical decision. I won't have anyting to do with it. Won't go, won't watch, won't buy a scrap of merchandise and will be boycotting all of the major sponsors of the event. That's really hard because football is practically my religion. But my religion is also against homosexuals being executed, against masses of workers being enslaved and worked to death, against adulterers (ie women who've been raped) being stoned, and against ISIL, who gets enormous support from Qatar, which is not even to mention corruption. What I'm seriously hoping is that FIFA has pushed us too far this time, and that many, including players and even countries, will boycott this with extreme prejudice. There is no other way to stop us being taken so for granted ever again. One gutless, amoral journalist after another disppoints me though. It's the grass roots or nothing.
Paul
Guest
If the possibilty of moving it to Nov-Dec was on the cards, Australia could have mounted a much stronger bid. Shuffling cricket Test matches around would be far easier than shuffling AFL and NRL fixtures, while the BBL would run during January. The A-League could start earlier and finish later.
Dean
Guest
Australia should never bid for the World Cup again. $45 million could be much better spent on grass roots football or a big stadium. The Government won't be stumping up that amount of cash any time soon until FIFA is cleaned up.
Kaks
Roar Guru
found the video, it was by John Oliver https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DlJEt2KU33I
AR
Guest
I think I saw that interview. Blatter stressed that FIFA was a non-for-profit organisation. When the interviewer's eyebrows arched, and asked "then why does FIFA hold billions of dollars in bank accounts?"...Blatter simply said: "well... we need reserves".
albatross
Roar Pro
As well as Qatar the spotlight needs to be turned on Switzerland which allows corrupt organizations (not just FIFA) to flourish under cover of their business secrecy laws, tax avoidance facilities and general lack of accountability. Perhaps to encourage change we need to boycott Adidas, Coca-Cola, Visa, McDonald’s, Emirates, Budweiser and Castrol. "How can FIFA be held accountable?" is worth a read... http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/admin/publication_files/2013.01.pdf
britesparke
Roar Rookie
Are there really any more surprises that this inept, corrupt organisation, that is the world governing body for our game, can come up with? The audacious, breathtakingly inept decision making continues- and why not? They are squirreling away the millions as a result of their highly lucrative "bidding process" only to weather the controversy after wave upon wave of valid criticism is stoically defended by "the old boys club". Honestly.....the gig is so good that "Septic" Blatter wants a fifth term of this?
Kaks
Roar Guru
@Kasey - i understand your game show metaphor, however people who go on game shows dont have much to start with and arent being offered millions or billions of dollars if they win, that is why it is so hard to turn down when you think about all the things you can finally buy IF you get the jackpot FIFA is filled with people who are already very wealthy and have a huge amount of money in the bank, just like you gadaffi reference, and yet they're happy to accept more brown envelopes to the detriment of the game they supposedly love. Put 100 normal football fans in FIFA's position and you will probably see the game come leaps and bounds.
Kasey
Guest
@kaks The problem with people like that is, $x is never enough. Colonel Gaddafi had squirreled away something like US$2b from his own country by the time he was ousted and killed. what was he going to do with that much money? Billions when mere millions would have sufficed. I think of it like a game show. You’ve won a certain amount, but then the suave host (or Fat Eddie)dangles the carrot of yet more money and the good old human greed impulse kicks in. At home removed from the pressure and stimulus of the stage the home viewer makes the rational decision and yells at the TV:” take your winnings and run!", but the contestant thinks, I can get one more and risks it all. Power corrupts. They might have gotten into administration to make the sport better, but I think they've become so used to way FIFA does business that they've lost sight of their moral responsibilities:( and so the gravy trasin continue to chug on:(
Kaks
Roar Guru
I remember watching a video where Sepp Blatter said that FIFA was a not-for-profit organisation that had a 8billion dollar bank reserve.. You would think that these crooks have gotten their fair share of dodgy boats and penthouses and would now like to either retire or help fix the game
sheek
Roar Guru
If you read your history, you find much to your dismay that FIFA was as corrupt at the beginning (well, almost) as it is now. Only the dates, names & places have changed over the decades, but the business of greed, self-interest, graft & corruption has largely gone unchecked. Perhaps the greatest tragedy is that generations of sports fan continue to stand on the sidelines in their apathy doing nothing to correct FIFA's wrongs. Sport is the opium of the masses, and we don't care how we get our fix as long it is delivered. Which is sad. We reap what we sow, & FIFA is merely a reflection of ourselves, as ugly as that may be.
Kasey
Guest
Ahh FIFA, we love our football but are constantly embarrassed and annoyed by the World Governing body:( If they change the dates of the World Cup; the ONLY right thing to do is to hold a re-vote assuming you could find anybody willing to go through FIFAs cr@p again. Sadly FIFA’s biggest problem, if you can believe it is Democracy. Burkina Faso has exactly the same clout (1 vote) as Brazil (one vote). Makes it rather easy to Hoover up a bunch of votes from the poorer nations by promising a world Class pitch here and there across the globe when the election for Blatter’s job comes up. Of course is there anybody that honestly believes that simply replacing Blatter will change much? Organisational inertia will ensure no matter who is in charge, very little will change.