****ing shambles. FIFA needs changing drastically. Blatter needs ousting, same with Platini at UEFA. Nothing against Qatar or the people there (I've been, it is incredibly hot but not that bad a place in urban areas), but they do not deserve the World Cup one jot and it should be stripped from them. I was about to say that it would be good to watch while at Uni, but its not for another 9 ****ing years...
The only 'major' leagues that benefit (I'm using the term major loosely) are the Brazilian and Russian leagues. And maybe the MLS.
The Premier League are expected to be the only ones to attempt to block it. The scheduling of the tournament will fit in with the winter break of Spain, Italy, etc. I think the Premier League will have to introduce a winter break for this season to accommodate it.
It isn't definitely going to be re-scheduled (to winter) and still held in Qatar. It could still be held in the summer but moved geographically. Whatever choice is made, it's likely to provoke a ****-storm of litigation, from whatever country feels aggrieved at the change: Quatar - if it's moved elsewhere; USA/Australia/etc if it's re-scheduled. Well done Blatter - you corrupt twat!
It shows that football is run by idiots. Didn't they think it through before awarding the cup to Qatar? I suppose it depended on who offered the biggest bribes.
Like I said - Qatar should be stripped of the tournament if it has to be held in Winter. The other bids that they could send it to were USA, Australia, South Korea and Japan. Personally, I'd want it in Australia or USA out of those four.
You answered your own question there Pete. It's always about the biggest brown envelope with FIFA. Russia getting the World Cup was the same. That should have gone to us or Spain/Portugal.
This isn't even true. There is so much more to a tournament than just the 2 weeks it's played. Overall the process takes a couple of months. Warm ups, tournament, rest for players. This doesn't fit into the schedule of any league that plays through parts of the winter. I don't like the idea of this, but I wouldn't mind seeing English football during the summer so this could be a test run.
I was only thinking about this other day, and despite there going to be (allegedly) air con in the stadiums, walking around outside would be a nightmare, and how the hell do you actually air con an entire stadium anyhow? Anyhoo, I was thinking, it'd be funny if Party Hull and his office witches went. Can you imagine?
The stadiums wont be the biggest problem, In the summer you need to drink loads(water) so going to the games will be the danger unless there are massive air conned areas near the stadiums, so in my opinion night time is the only option, as the last thing you want are thousands of people wandering about in temps of mid 40's and high humidity. Then add alcohol to it and you have a recipe for problems. I have had to learn to live here with the heat. Winter the temp on a night can be low enough to play football as it gets down to 12c. I still think it's crazy to hold it here the country is so small and the population that are 95% or so are foreign. So how many people is it being held for as a nation. I have said this stuff before.
Realistically it should have been Australia that got it. It was only in Japan/South Korea a few years ago & USA '94 is 20 years ago next year. Australia never had it & it fits Fifa's agenda of going places it's never been before.
Australia would probably be the one I'd choose as well overall, for the same reasons you mentioned. The only problem being the times that the matches will be on... 2002 was bad enough, getting up at 7am to watch England play Argentina...
