Subject: Qatar hosting worldcup?...

I cant believe there isnt a topic about this yet. it so much looks like a fix..

How can a country which is smaller than London host the cup successfully?

Again, what about all the wierd laws? e.g an unmarried woman who falls pregnant, is banned from using all hospitals? and theres probably more...

But then this is my opinion. what do you guys think?
(edited)

Uhh.. Qatar has about 1.7m people in it. Total. I think London has quite a bit more than that?

Warsaw has about this number of people, so I can imagine London being much bigger than that.

It's a shame, but FIFA is a corrupted organisation, nothing new...

It's not the most sensible place to have a world cup given the heat they have there in the summer.

They have said they will effectively air condition the stadiums, but that isn't a lot of good for the WC tourists who will be in heat they are far from used to. I think this bit sums things up from here:

Everyone who can leaves Qatar for the summer.

looks like a fix

is a fix

As has been said by many commentators, no country has a divine right to host the WC. We knew the system (and it's many flaws) when we entered the race.

Yes, we had the best technical bid. Yes, probably we had the best commercial bid. Yes, we had a great bid presentation. But if it was decided on these factors alone then there'd have been no need for a vote in the first place.

To me, the issue seems to be whether FIFA always wanted to use the next two WC's to break into new markets? If the answer is yes, then we shouldn't have been within a county mile of the bidding process in the first place. So either FIFA needs to be clearer about the criteria for awarding a WC, or we need to get a little better at reading the signals?

Personally, I always thought the purpose of the WC was to celebrate football at the highest level in a country that celebrated football, but this doesn't seem to be the case anymore though (if it ever was).

It'll be interesting to see what the attendances are like in Russia and Qatar. This is an area where I think FIFA would have a hard job arguing that South Africa was successful.

I don't mind Russia one bit to be honest... they have a pretty established system of leagues and an okay national team. I honestly don't think Russia will be bad at all. Qatar, different story..

I cant see russia being bad for the organisation of the thing, i just see it being utterly crap for atmosphere and hosting all the visitors. What was it at chelsea man u champs league final? No alcohol, more police than fans, palava over visa's and stuff, lots of precautionary arrests.

Plastic pitches, racism, hooliganism and politics will all play a part in that WC.

Plastic pitches, racism, hooliganism and politics will all play a part in that WC.

It'll either be that lot, or unbelievable police brutality to stop the aforementioned appearing on TV.

Wouldn't surprise me if there were shades of the Bejing Olympics with plants in the crowd, 'free' ticket give-aways to ensure stadiums look full, etc. etc.

You can go anywhere and find that crap though... Shall I bother posting those youtube vids of the Aston Villa v Birmingham game from this past week?

Two points though...

Hooliganism - England gets reminded of the problem whenever we consider bidding for a major tournament (despite their being no real issues at Euro'96), and at least we acknowledge and are tackling the problem.

Racism - Whilst far from perfect, this is something that the clubs/FA have largely got to grips with. Whereas in Russia... very different story.

i understand about russia getting it, like with SA they want somewhere new, it's never been to eastern europe, and russia is one of the biggest countries in the world.
qatar on the otherhand i really can't get my head round. the country is so small, and has a low population so it won't bring more fans to the game, maybe saudi arabia which is bigger but qatar? the temperatures will also be a serious problem...

But when did the WC become about going somewhere new? And who are the 'they'? Those 22 nice men on FIFA ExCo with every football fan's best interests at heart...

If this is the new raison d'être of the WC, then I can save everyone a small fortune on wasted bid submissions...

2026 - India
2030 - Nigeria
2034 - Indonesia
2038 - Colombia
2042 - Pakistan & Bangladesh - As joint hosts the distance between the two countries is significantly less than the distance across Russia!
2046 - Democratic Republic of Congo - ticks two boxes ...large population and diamonds
2050 - Turkey (we could count this as a European WC)
2054 - Iran - certainly breaking new ground, what about a joint bid with Iraq and Afghanistan?
2060 - Côte d'Ivoire - Diamonds, again...
2064 - North Korea - just for the hell of it!

Pretty much all footballing hotbeds and safe as houses...

Its not a fix, Qatar is a very rich Country. UK or England in this case are desperate and near bankrupt in comparison.

Qatar must be about the Asian TV audience. The games should kick off at a time convenient for the market. Then there is the prestige of having the finals in an Arab country, they can claim to be a properly world game I suppose.

5 Air conditioned stadiums, presumably on plastic ? And all to be dismantled and taken to Africa when they are done. Whole thing sounds like a massive white elephant to me.

whats being bankrupt got to do with anything though? We dont need to spend anything and would make a profit from the tournament to cover all the policing and whatever. Qatar won for their money and not for footballing reasons which is a fix, surely as they got it on the basis of something that isnt in the requirements?