The intrepid travellers from the Australian fan leaders’ delegation were in fine voice at the incredible Al Bayt Stadium, north of Doha, as the 2022 FIFA World Cup was unleashed on the world.
Never before has a group of Australian football fans had to dodge so much flak in order to deliver on their promise of showcasing their nation at a match not even involving their team.
The fan leader network has been blighted by misguided media reports that the members chosen to represent each one of the 32 countries were being asked to do so in return for favourable social media posts and asked to ‘dob in’ fellow fans who post derogative messages against the FIFA World Cup in Qatar.
We go back to the end of 2021 when this fan leader network came into being. A small selection of dedicated Socceroos supporters were sought out by Qatar’s Supreme Committee to become part of a worldwide group of football fans who would meet regularly online to share ideas and issues with the game and to discuss how the tournament could appeal to all different audiences.
Australia’s qualification path was looking rocky at this stage, this was a purely voluntary role and yes, the fan leaders were fed graphics and information to share on social platforms to promote Qatar as a desirable destination. It was seen as something interesting to be involved in, a service to football and a way of being part of a tournament that could possibly be out of reach for our national team.
Fast forward to June, and the dramatic climax to qualifying via the Intercontinental Play-offs in Doha, when Andrew Redmayne’s right hand sent breakfasts flying across the country.
All of a sudden, the Socceroos were going to the World Cup and there was a mad rush to acquire the necessary group stage tickets and to firm up flights and accommodation by those fans who simply could not miss this unexpected World Cup opportunity. The ticket situation was gruelling, but thanks to persistence and late nights in front of a slowly refreshing screen, most fans travelling to Qatar had the necessary trifecta of group D games. A community was forming, those daring to venture into the unknown of Qatar undeterred by the overwhelming negative points presented to them daily.
The opening ceremony of the FIFA World Cup at Al Bayt Stadium in Al Khor, Qatar, on Sunday, Nov. 20, 2022. Qatar 2022 is arguably the most scrutinized World Cup in history, and executives are faced with a dilemma as pundits and politicians raise concerns over the host country. Photographer: Christopher Pike/Bloomberg via Getty Images
And so we move into September, two months out from the tournament. The Supreme Committee of Qatar announced to the fan leaders that each of the qualified countries, and other countries involved in the fan leader network, would need to rustle up a group of up to 50 fans to represent their country in Qatar.
Eight weeks to come up with a list of people willing to be involved in fan activations and most importantly the opening ceremony. In return, each person in the group would be eligible for free flights, free accommodation and, until it was revoked last week, a daily allowance to cover refreshments. These people would need to prove that they were super-fans of their country’s football team. No fake fans allowed.
The fan leaders were then tasked with assembling that squad from across Australia in record time. Some were going to Qatar already, signed up with the Fanatics or the Green and Gold Army with intricately planned flights via other destinations, and didn’t need or want the flights or accommodation.
Some actually live in Qatar and were just happy to be involved in the greatest event in the country’s history. The best stories came from passionate fans who had written off their chances of attending the World Cup due to the expense, and who were given one last-chance opportunity to attend.
Of course, there were some who simply couldn’t take advantage due to the last-minute nature of the proposition, and there were those who had made the call already to boycott the whole charade, citing the much-publicised human rights and LGBTQ+ issues that have attracted much ire around the globe. But for those who were offered this chance of a lifetime and took it, it was a dream come true.
Enter the media. You’re not allowed to have nice things, you know. Reports out of Holland suggested that the fan leader delegation was being assembled to blindly promote Qatar, to sell their souls to the organisers and to report any miscreants who sullied the name of the organising country. The coverage was widespread.
Condemnation was swift. Much virtue-signalling on social media accompanied a fierce uproar; if Twitter users could carry burning torches and pitchforks, they would have burned the whole fan leader network to the ground.
How dare these people take gifts from Qatar, how could they sleep at night? Quite easily, I’d imagine, safe in the knowledge that they had scored a free trip to the biggest football tournament on earth, one they had previously given up all hope of attending. The only missed sleep would have been through excitement; this was a reward for following the Socceroos around the country and around the world in previous tournaments.
One such fan, Oscar Sanchez, 32 of Adelaide, had been to the previous three World Cups to support his beloved Socceroos, but this one was deemed out of reach. When offered the surprise opportunity to attend, he was eager to see just how life really is in Qatar instead of relying on the often-embellished stories peddled in the media; the draw of several A-list acts to the football fan festivals was an added incentive to attend.
Another ardent fan, Matthew Brown, 36, now based in London, had costed a trip to Qatar once qualification had been secured, but was unable to justify the high costs of the flights. He remembers the excited call from one of the fan leaders in September, and was thrilled to accept the generous offer from Qatar’s Supreme Committee to attend the opening ceremony.
The much-publicised withdrawal of long-time Socceroos fan Pablo Bateson came and went, the Football Supporters Australia stalwart no longer able to justify his initial decision to participate. Fans from other nations were not so wrapped up in the morality of the scheme – indeed the English FA had actively promoted it earlier in the year.
After all, when the scheme was stripped bare, and the somewhat fluid agenda finalised, the ultimate goal emerged – simply to get a group of fervent football fans to Al Bayt Stadium to make a good fist of the opening ceremony to show the world that the FIFA World Cup had arrived in Qatar.
On opening night those 49 remaining Socceroos fans delivered, as did all the other fans leaders’ delegations from around the world who joined in a specifically mixed playlist of 32 chants, one from each of the qualified countries.
You’ll know who they are now, their faces splashed across our television screens. They’re not bad people. You’ll know a lot of them if you ever went to a Socceroos game and joined in with the active support behind the goals in the category C seats. They will be at the next qualifying games and will be cheering their team on to the next World Cup and beyond.
The mood tonight was joyful, the tournament opened in a positive fashion despite the loss for the host nation, and the next four weeks, warts and all, will be memorable.
One especially good thing to come out of tonight was the axing of “Aussie Aussie Aussie, Oi, Oi, Oi” from the playlist; the nation’s cricket team can own that particularly shameful chant, and the Supreme Committee were left in no doubt that it would have been an offence to football in Australia to sing it as part of the celebrations tonight.
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