Russia wins 2018 rights, Qatar to host 2022

[Closed Account 2]

II would have liked for it to come to England in 2018 but I dont mind that Russia got it either. Qatar is a bizarre selection, I don't really buy the bringing football to the Middle East argument - It stinks of cash, cash and more cash.

I posted this in another forum:

The sad thing is for all the talk of the Arabian people meeting fans from all over the world and the world fans seeing Arabian culture, which was a big unique selling point, I just don't see it happening very well in Qatar.

Average income in Qatar is $60,000, 4th highest in the World. It's inhabitants have the financial means to travel anywhere in the World, contrast that to say Egypt $2,400, Kuwait $24,000 or Iran $4,400. Will the average citizen from these countries really be able to afford to take a trip to Qatar (hotels, travel, food etc)? If it had gone to one of these countries at least it wouldn't have just been a rich elite of locals who would have been able to attend.

Also what does Qatar offer, culturally, for foreign fans attending ? According to wikitravel the following:

http://wikitravel.org/en/Qatar#See

An art museum, a souq (market), some man-made island and forts and shopping malls. It's not really the same as the Pyramids at Giza, Palmyra in Syria, or the old city of Persepolis. Compared to those I don't think Qatar is going to offer a genuine Arabian / Middle Eastern experience to visitors at the World Cup.

[Junior]

Yeah, Id agree with all that.

The radio program I listened to earlier quoted average income as $105,000 pa (same point, just a bigger figure! I have no idea which is the more accurate but its years ahead of anywhere else thats for sure.)

I think FIFA made a point about Qatar being within 4hrs travel time of xx million people - How many people from India, Pakistan, SE Asia, Africa etc..etc.. are going to travel? Ridiculous argument (unless it was made purely in terms of timezones but I doubt it)

Culturally? Its laughable, the cities that some of these stadiums will have been built in will be less than 10 years!!!!

Post World Cup? - Most of the icons of the tournament (i.e. the stadiums) will be dismantled and spread across other parts of the world.

Ching ching......

[Dodge]

The timezone argument I heard was that Qatar was the best option for European TV audiences.

[Closed Account 2]

I took the figures from the IMF report 2009/10:

Here (via wikipedia )

I'd guess it's a difference between income and GDP, but either way it's in the top 5-10 in terms of richest countries p.h. population in the world.

[Dodge]

I took the figures from the IMF report 2009/10:

Here (via wikipedia )

I'd guess it's a difference between income and GDP, but either way it's in the top 5-10 in terms of richest countries p.h. population in the world.

Can't read too much into those figures, Qater is 4th but Ireland is 6th... (download the excel version and sort to check...)

[pineapple stu]

An art museum, a souq (market), some man-made island and forts and shopping malls. It's not really the same as the Pyramids at Giza, Palmyra in Syria, or the old city of Persepolis. Compared to those I don't think Qatar is going to offer a genuine Arabian / Middle Eastern experience to visitors at the World Cup. [/i]

Not sure I'd agree with that. I haven't been to any of the sites mentioned but, though they're obviously quite iconic, the pyramids in particular are almost a bit of a tourist trap at this stage I think; city landscape in the back, hawkers everywhere trying to pimp rides on camels to tourists at high prices. Is that a genuine cultural experience? Surely the least developed country in tourist terms (I would imagine Qatar out of those) would offer a more genuine experience? What could be more middle-east than browsing a souq, for example?

(And that's assuming you go to a World Cup for the cultural side of things, which sounds near to impossible going on reports of FIFAworld at recent World Cups)

[SkStu]

Either way its laughable that people think that this result means FIFA is corrupt while a victory for the US or the UK would've been fair. have none of you heard of wikileaks? They're more corrupt than most.

not really sure what wikileaks has to do with this but FIFA is a shambles and football is rotten from the top down. I personally believe an award to the US over Qatar would have been less obviously corrupt (fair is the wrong word) and have similar concerns about Russias award over England.

its actually sickening to hear the England bid people (and their media cheerleaders) refuse to even entertain the thought that their bid wasn't impeccable.

"excellent and remarkable" were Blatters remarks about Englands bid. It was the top bid overall according to the pre-vote evaluation reports. Even beneath all the glitz, celebrity and sheen it was by all accounts a very, very strong bid and I say the English have every reason to be a bit miffed.

[Dodge]

Those are the words he used for their presentation, not their bid. He said similar for all them. England's bid was criticised for lack of training facilities. You don't hear sky mentioning that?

[SkStu]

no - not for lack of training facilities. Lack of training facilities in close proximity to the stadia/team hotels which would hardly seem to represent the most insurmountable of problems given the excellent transport and infrastructure of Englands bid.

To refer back to your original post on this matter - the very fact that "not one of us" has seen the bids or evaluation reports (which were overwhelmingly damning of Qatars bid by the way) merely highlights the lack of transparency of FIFA and this whole bidding process. Is it any wonder that most people believe that these awards were corrupt?

[Dodge]

So why the outrage now? It's always been the case. Outrage seems to stem from English language media all crying about their bids on same day

[SkStu]

well then apply that logic to everything and see how far it gets you.

Why are people complaining about the Irish government now? Sure, its always been that way.
Why all the outrage over islamic subversion of women? Sure its always been that way.

I admire your nonchalant cynicism most of the time Dodge but youre wrong on this occasion in my opinion..

[osarusan]

So why the outrage now? It's always been the case. Outrage seems to stem from English language media all crying about their bids on same day

Yet we have Anson saying there's no point England applying with the system the way it is at the moment. Well seeing you knew what the system was, why did you bother applying this time then?

What gets me is the fake shock that FIFA might do business in a shady and underhand way, and the attempt to convince everybody that the FA were unaware of this. Indeed, there's even a subtle hint that they lost because they weren't involved in the kind of skullduggery the other bidders were (gifts of designer handbags notwithstanding).

[Dodge]

Why are people complaining about the Irish government now? Sure, its always been that way.
Why all the outrage over islamic subversion of women? Sure its always been that way.

A little perspective here?

Sweet jesus

[Spudulika]

I personally would have backed the English bid, if it had included Scotland and Wales, that would have been a real turn up, but it was never going to be. This was a major attempt at legacy bidding by Blair, carried on by Cameron and an effort to show how great England is. However they grabbed the Olympics for 2012, with all sorts of allegations in a far more corrupt voting system, yet where's the outcry over that? Geoff Thompson was whingeing afterwards about how they'd been guaranteed votes (presmably by Warner as they'd sent the English team out to play in Trinidad despite the ongoing court battles) - I'm sorry, but the day that you can be "guaranteed" votes, well, it's almost more Russian than anything else. One of the major factors FIFA pointed out (domestically) is that Russian football is still the game of the people with far greater accessibility to all levels of society - compared to England anywhere seems cheap!

Also this nonsense about hooliganism and racism, sorry, but there is too much false information doing the rounds now and smacks of a) sour grapes and b) total misinformation. There is racism in Russia, same as anywhere else, though colour is less to do with it that perceived ethnicity (I've experienced that myself). In stadia it's there though experienced in provincial clubs and against Caucasian groups. Hooliganism is present though not like that toole Danny Dyer presented, it's in a traditional form local faction fighting that is normally carried out over the winter and is far more prevalent during bandy season. What's more important is what will happen after the world cup to the new grounds, though it was explained to be that there will be a growth in interest that will lead to more bums on seats. Can't see it personally but all bids said the same thing.

Qatar, strange one, but it can work. I'd have preferred to have seen Saudi get it though they've pledged never to host it, maybe a joint bid Qatar-UAE-Bahrain would have made more sense. Though at least an Irish company is going to earn from it all!

[Lionel Ritchie]

Good post Spud. I'm disappointed England didn't get it but there's some balance and food for thought in there.

Meanwhile amongst all the dummy spitting that's going on in England Ken Bates manages to set new highs ...or lows I dunno. He wants to puncture the ball and run in home for his fish fingers anyway.

From Leeds United.com "United chairman Ken Bates is calling on the bigger footballing nations to consider breaking away from FIFA, following the double decision to hand the 2018 World Cup to Russia and the 2022 competition to Qatar...."

[superfrank]

Roll the calendar back twelve months and Irish people were all complaining about how corrupt FIFA was and how it should be exposed, etc. The English whining going on now is no different. FIFA upsets a country or its fans and the fans and country start mudslinging. It'd be much easier to entertain these complaints of corruption if the Spanish FA or Brazilian FA (or another one of FIFA's favourites) were making them. When an association, or its fans, who FIFA has upset complains, it'll always seem bitter.

That's not to suggest that it isn't true (I've read plenty to suggest FIFA is horribly corrupt) but there's no chance at all that the FA/English media (Panorama aside) would have the balls to make those same allegations before the vote or if they'd won. I'm not surprised whatsoever that people are blaming Panorama for the loss.

However, with all the talk of Russian hooliganism, I've found it funny that no-one in the English media has even considered the possibility that the trouble at the Birmingham derby the night before the vote could have raised concerns about hooliganism in their own back yard.

On the bids themselves, I have no problem with Russia getting it. It is a traditional footballing nation and they have a thriving league. The Qatar bid boggles from a infrastructural and football point of view but, of course, money talks.

[Spudulika]

That's precious Lionel (the Ken Bates rant), I've read with interest the outpouring from Burden - he said he couldn't work with FIFA as they were too corrupt - and he discovered this when exactly.....? It's as corrupt as the FA, the FAI or whatever other governing organisation in the world who can sense where gain can be made. What it most laughable of all is that he insists that "no fewer than 6" members promised to vote for England - why? What bought them off? And everybody is claiming Geoff Thompson voted for England, what if he didn't? Isn't it corrupt that he had a vote at all?

This will run and run because it's ruined the next chance for overpaid and overhyped english footballers to flop at a tournament finals, but be close to home.

[pineapple stu]

What is most laughable of all is that he insists that "no fewer than 6" members promised to vote for England - why? What bought them off?

And as well, how many other bids did those people promise votes to?

[ArdeeBhoy]

Glad 'Ingerland' didn't get it, they're far too up themselves for it to have been a good thing. Despite some great, if souless, stadia and an over-rated transport system. And it would have been a complete rip-off, money-wise.
Not to mention the mutant hooliganism/latent racism threat.
Though agree Russia could be even worse in all these respects.

As for 'Papa Smurf', aka. Ken B*tes, p*ssing in the wind about any breakaway.

Lastly Russia/Qatar, a bit off the wall.
Who cares anyway where the Finals are played anyway, besides attending them as a fan, most World Cup Final games are fecking cr*p these days....

[The Fly]

McGeady's move to Spartak swung it for the Russians, apparently.