*And Bahrain. Maybe the U.A.E. Possibly Kuwait. Yemen, maybe? Anyone else?
Remember when Qatar, with its promises of awesome stadia and an air conditioned country, won the 2022 World Cup. I do: I was pretty pissed about it. I got all in a harangue, and complained for weeks. It was upsetting.
Somehow – and I really don't know how this happened – in all that kerfuffle, I didn't even notice that Bahrain, the U.A.E. and Qatar's fellow Gulf states had submitted bids, too, and that those bids had been thoroughly scrutinized, researched, validated and voted upon. Strange, I know, but it must have happened, because FIFA keeps talking about how these other countries are going to be hosting World Cup matches.
[PRBREAK][/PRBREAK]
All jokes aside, this whole thing has gone from ridiculous to, well, hugely more ridiculous. Through a dubious-at-best voting process, FIFA awarded Qatar the tournament. Then it emerged that Qatar's showpiece technologies (specifically, the air conditioned stadiums) were more theoretical than real. In response, FIFA said "well, we'll just have it in the winter," a huge "fuck you" to, well, everyone. By changing the World Cup to winter – which wasn't part of Qatar's bid – FIFA is saying, "we didn't really think this Qatar thing through, but we're going to do it anyways, and you can't stop us." The headache of wrangling the schedules of European football to accommodate the Qatar World Cup will be severe – and probably won't be much appreciated in England (and, to some degree, Spain and Portugal), who are already pissed at FIFA for the debacle surrounding awarding Russia the 2018 finals.
(As a side note, Don Garber must be at turns livid and relieved with the idea of a winter World Cup: sure, it won't conflict with the MLS season, but after years of FIFA complaining about the sanctity of international dates, Garber was actually prepared to move MLS's season to accommodate an American World Cup. Suddenly Qatar comes in, and FIFA is more than happy to reschedule the World Cup itself. I'd love to be a fly on the wall the next time Garber gets a tsk, tsk from Geneva over an FC Dallas v. DC United game on a FIFA date.)
And, now, worst of all, the prospect of Qatar sharing the World Cup with its neighbours looks like a very real possibility. I wouldn't fault the Australian, American, Korean and Japanese soccer federations for dropping out of FIFA altogether over this. It's absurd – five countries spent years, untold man-hours, untold millions of dollars and untold greasy moments in the company of FIFA executives building comprehensive bids for the World Cup. To get to the final vote, they did all the work, filed every form on time, dotted all the I's, crossed all the T's, jumped through all the administrative hoops. Then, in the end, the were denied by a through severely dubious vote. Now the get to hear that World Cup matches will be hosted – and all the associated financial benefits enjoyed – by countries that didn't submit a bid at all.
And why? Well, if you ask FIFA, it's to broaden the impact of this landmark tournament in the Arabic world. Which, of course, is horsecrap. I'd say it's got a whole lot more to do with the fact that, again, they didn't really think this whole Qatar thing through, and the reality of hosting the world's biggest sporting event in continental Asia's smallest country is sinking in.