Football World Cup in Qatar 2022 - good or bad?

The bid was accepted because people were BRIBED. Joseph Blatter is one of the most corrupt individuals to walk on earth. But FIFA will get pressure from its member organizations and from fan representatives and the media leading up to the event, and they will pass some of that pressure on to Qatar. It is not an intrusion to sovereignty to agree on certain guidelines for an event this little dwarf of a country applied for. If it turns out that Qatar cannot meet certain requirements, FIFA can always take the world cup back and give it to another country.

 

http://bikyamasr.com/wordpress/?p=22375

World Cup in Qatar is plain wrong

FIFA’s decision to award the 2022 World Cup to the tiny emirate of Qatar is, put bluntly, bold, baffling and just plain wrong.

Yes, the bid was impressive and innovative, and goodness knows how Arabs must feel by being awarded the rights to the second most important sporting event in the world.

But human rights issues aside – international governing bodies rarely notice these things anyway – there are simply far too many negatives with the Qatari announcement.

First and foremost, given what Wikileaks has revealed in those US embassy cables in the past week, isn’t rewarding Qatar the rights asking for trouble?

Like many, I was skeptical about Iran’s nuclear ambitions. But having now read the private thoughts and lobbying from Sunni Arab leaders to bomb Iran – Qatari PM Hamad bin Jassim bin Jaber Al Thani branded his Persian neighbors as ‘liars’ – this is an open invite for the Iranian regime to cause mischief between now and 2022.

More dangerously, what’s to stop Iran actually bombing Qatar during the World Cup? According to US diplomats in the U.A.E., an Iranian ballistic missile would take just 46 seconds to fly across the Strait of Hormuz.

Does that mean Israel and the United States will now need to disarm Iran beforehand through war – with tacit approval and support from America’s Arab allies?

Talking of Israel, what will actually happen if – in the unlikely event – they qualify for the World Cup? Sure, the Qatar 2022 bid team have already addressed the issue by saying that Israel would have no trouble participating, but in such a volatile region, that can be interpreted as a hollow promise, no matter how binding the agreement is. Those spineless fat cats at FIFA could even succumb to Arab pressure and ban Israel from playing.

Further, can the Israeli team’s safety be guaranteed or are we at risk from another Black September Munich massacre? Or what if they are drawn against another Arab nation, like Saudi Arabia? Would Arab teams then boycott the tournament?

In addition, would Arab television channels broadcast a blank screen every time the Israelis play, as they already do in other sporting tournaments such as tennis and athletics? What would FIFA make of that?!

Thirdly, for all the talks about playing matches in solar-powered, environmentally friendly and air-conditioned football stadiums, traveling supporters and officials would still need to get from one place to another before they reach the venues. Will these places also be air-conditioned?

When I went to Dubai a couple of years ago to visit the Burj al Arab, I remembered having to walk a fair few yards from the cool reception of the Burj back to the air-conditioned bus-stop a couple of hundred meters away. It wasn’t far, but the heat was intense – and that was in April. How many of these small walks will be under cover in Qatar when the temperatures will be in the 40s? Don’t tell me they’re building air-con travelators and underground tunnels for visiting fans?

On a related point, if you plan on going to the tournament for 2-3 weeks – as many Europeans do no matter where the tournament is held – what is there to do in Qatar apart from sitting in bars, shopping malls, hotel rooms and the odd museum? It’s far too hot outdoors and one can’t just cross the border into Saudi Arabia for a few days. Let’s hope they build that bridge to Bahrain soonish …

More importantly, bearing in mind that many traveling supporters will be visiting from poorer continents, will there be enough cheap accommodation to house so many people in this rich Gulf state?

And how many people will actually go to the World Cup in Qatar?

If previous sporting events in Doha are anything to go by, then we can expect many empty seats during the early stages in 2022. You only have to look at the TV pictures from last month’s WTA end-of-season women’s tennis championships to see how Qataris feel about their sport. If South Africa’s population of 45 million couldn’t fill out all its stadia this summer – what chance has Qatar?

This tiny emirate registers one-thirtieth of the South African population, and I bet you the organizers won’t even have enough school children to fill those empty seats! But at least most of its inhabitants will be able to afford those exorbitant ticket prices, which cannot be said for what happened this past summer.

In terms of football, what justice is there for a national side ranked as low as 113th in the world to just waltz into the last 32 of the world championships of football without even needing to qualify?

Currently sandwiched between the Central African Republic and Thailand in the FIFA World football ranking, Qatar will never make an impact on the sport. It’s all very well they start dishing out passports and fat checks to Kenyan marathon runners to switch nationality prior to the Olympic Games. But a national football team isn’t something one could just assemble within 12 years – it takes time to nurture. Furthermore, money can’t buy false national pride.

In addition, the legacy of a World Cup is supposed to benefit the game of football within the host nation.

Looking back Major League Soccer has evolved from virtually nothing in 1994 to the massive commercial enterprise that it is now.

France, meanwhile, won the European Championships two years after winning the World Cup on home soil in 1998, and four years later, Japan and South Korea co-hosted the tournament and both national sides are now considered the two top nations in Asian football, with Japan doing particularly well in this year’s World Cup.

So, the question is – how will Qatari football fare after 2022? About as much impact as introducing curling to Tanzanians. Its population is too small – and most of it, transient.

Lastly, a side note to any World Cup is also the issue of prostitution, and the question here is how will they service all these international football fans during this five-week window – by busing in Saudi escorts or flying them in from the Philippines, and thus creating another branch in human trafficking?

Just about the only plus point with the successful Qatari bid is that matches will be played in a time-zone which suits the lucrative European market. I don’t really buy this whole Arab pride belief because Qatar is not representative of the rest of the Middle East, and if you speak with anyone on the streets in Cairo or Damascus and they will have most likely have negative views on those ‘arrogant’, soulless oil and gas rich Gulf States.

Australia should have been awarded the honor as it is the perfect country to host an event of this magnitude. Its climate is agreeable in June/July, and there are plenty to do to amuse visiting fans both on and off the pitch. Time-zone could be problematic for FIFA but Australian soccer is on the up, and there’s nothing better to take it forward than hosting the World Cup.

As a sports fan, I want any major tournament to succeed. Qatar 2022 is undoubtedly an interesting and brave choice on FIFA’s part (corruption or otherwise) and could do Western-Arab relations a whole lot of good. But I just find it very hard to get excited by this announcement and can already visualize the atmosphere in 2022 being a little ‘sterile’.

Not a word you’d ever use if the first Arab/Muslim World Cup were to be held in Egypt or Turkey….two proper football nations.

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I agree - Turkey or Egypt would have at least had a football history, especially Turkey, although especially Egypt obviously would not have been able to pour as much money into this as the Qatar people.

Is it true that Arab television channels blank out the screen when Israeli athletes are on screen in athletics and tennis? How crazy and de-humanizing is that? Speaks volumes...

 

Dumb and reactionary at the same time. Impressive.

 

Just because you found a few individual cases of Israeli citizens who made it into Qatar does not mean that there are no issues:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visa_r...ountries_that_do_not_accept_Israeli_passports

Countries that might not accept passports which contain Israeli stamps or visas
Algeria
Iran[7]
Kuwait[8]
Lebanon[1]
Libya[9]
Pakistan[159]
Qatar [10]
Saudi Arabia[11]
Sudan[12]
Syria[2]
Yemen[13][14]

http://www.voyage.gc.ca/countries_pays/report_rapport-eng.asp?id=244000

So if you are gay like adeelsiddiqui, but restrict yourself to making sure that you do not show it outside the confines of your home, you are fine, you say? Can gay couplese like adeelsiddiqui and his boyfriend then book a double room with a king size bed?

 

No, I was referring to a thread in the Hangout that was started under your moniker, if I remember correctly, that said you were coming out of the closet. You later said it was your cousin who started it. I can't find the thread right now, though, so maybe I am confusing you with someone.