Qatar, Riyadh and the dark side of Sport

Now suddenly there's an alcohol ban at matches during the World Cup Finals
Forcing FIFA to renege on a massive sponsorship deal with Budweiser.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/63674631

What are the Qataris going to demand next? That male and female fans should sit in separate stands during games?
What a fiasco.

Of course, booze can still be consumed in the executive hospitality areas
So the wealthy and powerful are allowed to sin against God with impunity in Qatar - just as they are over here.

 

I hear FIFA are issuing their own armbands for players to wear during the World Cup Finals.
Logo will be something along these lines...



Also, Putin's buddy Infantino has flipped his lid.
His latest comments about Europe's concerns over Qatar are beyond parody.
If the silly old sod isn't careful the next World Cup Finals won't have any European teams in it.

 

Infantino is a cvnt.

 

I'm sorry that he was bullied at school.
But to compare that unpleasant experience directly with the abuse and killing of migrant workers in Qatar, or their treatment of women and gender orientation minorities (not even to mention Jewish folk and people of other religions), is grossly disproportionate to the point of being insulting.
Infantino has been bought and paid for by the Qatari regime.

He brings Football into disrepute. Not the hundreds of organisations like Amnesty, or the dozens of FAs who have expressed concerns.
He's as unfit to lord it over FIFA as Blatter ever was.

 

Given the whole saga around FIFA, the bungs, backhanders and blatant corruption, the idea of the president turning up in a country who should never have got the World Cup and criticising people is another vlassic own goal.



Fifa should have been dismantled and a new structure built. I have had little info on Infantino, but yesterday suggests the same sanctimonious holier than thou claptrap we got from Blatter.

 

The Football Associations have all caved in to FIFA's yellow card threat over the 'one love' armbands.

Thus, at a stroke, FIFA elevated that harmless gesture into a proper protest, where something had to be sacrificed in the doing of it.
But the FA's were not willing to make any sacrifices. So FIFA and their Qatari paymasters get their way AGAIN.

A pathetic response to the human rights failings of the host Regime. And the deaths, injuries and systematic abuse of migrant workers in that country.

 

On the other side of the pitch, the Iranians refuse to sing their national anthem in protests at the deaths in their country, which could cost them much more than a yellow card when/if they go home. I'm glad we won I guess, but the whole thing was just a shameful capitulation to another FIFA exercise in sports washing. Better to not even to have suggested the rainbow armbands if you are going to back off when FIFA threaten sporting sanctions.
And congtratulations to FIFA for staying loyal to the hand that feeds them. Please issue another lecture to Europe about hypocracy, so we can play it over and over when the next police/FBI investigation takes place,

 

FIFA are shameless cvnts.

 

Denmark are going to wear the armband in spite of FIFA threats. Good on you Denmark!

 

Huge respect to the Danes if they go through with it.

And when the referee books their Captain for wearing the armband, he should immediately hand that armband to a team-mate.
Let's see if the referee will issue 11 yellow cards - then issue another 11 when the players continue to pass the armband again.
The match would be called off without a ball being kicked.

If the ref (put in an impossible position) refuses to act again after booking the Danish Captain, then the team should ignore the yellow card. And should the captain get booked again during the match and thus be sent off, the whole Danish team should walk off the pitch in protest.
By issuing this yellow card threat FIFA is abusing its referees as much as it is abusing the players.

That's how you stand up to a bully.
You call their bluff. You make them hurt you, so they show everybody else their true colours.

I have always strongly felt that all politics should be kept out of football.
But I feel even more strongly that all corruption should be kept out of football.
The Qatari regime has bought and paid for FIFA.
They bought it back in 2010 and they have owned it ever since.
Infantino is their glove puppet.

If Denmark dare to stand up to the corrupted authorities then we should stand by them. And hang our heads in shame that we lacked the moral courage to do what they have done.

 

The unique atmosphere of this World Cup Finals is proceeding apace...

• Fans missing part of the England game because FIFA's ticket system went on the fritz
• Folks having water bottles taken off them, or labels torn off the bottles, because they had the wrong logos on them
• Wales fans having rainbow style hats confiscated by stewards at the turnstiles

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-63710435

Still, on the bright side - we haven't had any riots or crushes or violence or arrests yet (as far as I know)

 

FIFA wouldn't mind the Danes getting kicked out, as long as Qatar is kept happy. If all the teams stood together it would be a different story, but that won't happen. It's a pity Denmark are the only Scandinavian country there.

 

Sadly, the Danes folded on the rainbow armband too. But the problem rolls on. Germany have lost one of their sponsors forgiving way to FIFA blackmail' while Deutsche Telekom are considering what to do and have demanded an explanation from the German FA, who are considering legal moves.

But I believe the rumour yesterday that FIFA are threatening that any country caught wearing a rainbow armband will be dumped with all the Budweiser the Qatari's refuse to sell, was just a social media lie

 

All this has taken attention away from the slaves who died building the stadiums, thousands of them. FIFA knew what was happening and didn't lift a finger. Homosexuality was illegal here when England won the W/C in 1966, and can you imagine the response if a bunch of foreigners tried to tell us to change our laws? Oscar Wilde had to do hard labour because of his same-sex relationship.

 

Yeah, I agree. The armband was only a symbol like taking the knee which has proved pretty damned shallow. Actually my beef on this one is much more with FIFA than Qatar. Yes, Qatar said that people wearing rainbows would be welcome, an they wanted gays to feel part of the event, and are now reneging on that, but FIFA sold the tournament to them and have (and continue to) defended the regime they sold it to. The Budweiser affair was just another piece of Qatari saying all the right stuff and then going back to type, but again FIFA are implicit in this, and are happily stamping on anyone who dares suggest things are not great. I'd like to see a breakaway new format from the major European, American, Asian and African football associations form up, and try and be a bit less corrupt. Can't see it though - all the money in football will bring all the dodgy business types swarming in again.

 

The Foreign Secretary says (in effect) Gay folk are safe in Qatar...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-63725627

But I'm unclear on the law there.
Is it just homosexual activity that is illegal in Qatar - which would probably include holding hands and /or kissing in public?
Or is it illegal to actually be homosexual.
The former is based on public behaviour, the latter would make actual individuals criminals - regardless of how they behave.

If Qatari law follows the latter line, then if I was LGBTQ I'd be going nowhere near the place, regardless of what Cleverly says.
This regime will have lists and dossiers on people.
No way should anyone be subject to arrest or criminal sanction (or the fear of it) simply for being who they are.

 

Germany lose to Japan.

Credit to the Japanese team, but from what I've heard on the radio, the German People have by-and-large turned their backs on their team and the World Cup Finals. There is no 'World Cup fever' in Germany. Collectively the nation is largely ignoring this tournament.
They are less willing than many in this country to turn a blind eye to the corruption, abuse and inequality that surrounds the 2022 Finals, in the name of simply getting behind their team and enjoying the football - in other words, appeasing the sports-washing.
Perhaps they have learned the bitter lesson of where intolerance ultimately leads better than we have.

 

Usually I try to watch nearly every game, but this time I've hardly seen any, not even the highlights. What FIFA has done to the beautiful game has put me right off, and I think future W/C's will be tainted as well. Infantino is even worse than Blatter. He's allowed to spend over an hour lecturing fans and preaching to them but no-one else can make any criticism? No thanks.

 

Under normal circumstances I have little time for solitary pitch invaders. But circumstances at the World Cup Finals are far from normal...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/63788618

Well done to this protester - first for getting his shirt & flag through security at the match, then for actually getting onto the pitch.
Quite a lot of egg on the faces of stewards I should think.
I hope the Regime doesn't decide to make an example of this guy. Depends where he hails from I expect.

 

A migrant worker fell to his death at the Saudi training camp during the group stages of the World Cup Finals.
This was the response of a Qatari regime spokesman;

"Death is part of life..."
The Qataris have also denied the worker was carrying out official work.
And they have asked why the World's media is highlighting this event.
Human life obviously means nothing to them.