Not an easy thing to figure all of this out, admittedly. When Qatar won the hosting rights over several rival bidders who were pretty sure that they would have beaten the peninsular state in the middle of the Middle East, there was plenty of crying about alleged foul play.
Several investigations later, be they internal, overt or covert, executed by ‘official investigators’ (such as chief FIFA investigator Garcia, who, one hears, is about to throw in the towel in favour of kitchen utensils, i.e. married life in New York) or unofficial pundits dripping with self-righteousness (you know who), nothing has come forward that would justify yet more investigation.
Rumours are usually insufficient to convict somebody of wrong-doing. This may be a sobering and unpleasant fact to those who were desperately hoping to find some dirt both on Russia and Qatar. Whispers and innuendo are simply not quite enough to convict.
But, the investigations have gone on and on and on. And the results continue to be…well, there just aren’t any. No one-day companies have been identified, no slush funds found, no suspicious wire transfers seen nor any brown envelopes found that had finger prints of bad men on them.
Nonetheless, the upright and the clean (usually hailing from a country where the likes of GSK are headquartered and, how unfortunate, allegedly paid bribes to Chinese officials worth double-digit millions if not more) and the righteous and the ethical (the latter guys live in a parallel universe that so reeks of hypocrisy that half the world is up in arms against them of late), have all tried hard to find some dirt, and all they found is a mirror of their own malice and incompetence.
But hey, who knows? Maybe round 18 will deliver the desperately needed smoking gun? With literally everybody’s communications being ‘meta-collected’, it shouldn’t be a problem to find some culprits, should it?
Enter FIFA.
Its Executive Committee took a rather amusing decision in December of 2010 when it awarded the 2022 World Cup to a small country that so suffers from the heat of summer that its citizens who can, usually spend their summers in milder climes, preferably the South of France, or indeed: Britain. Qatar was the winner and its staunch ally, the US, started to hyperventilate. As did the English who tend to hyperventilate quite a bit when they lose. No matter what they lose, or why.
Only a few ExCo Members had actually visited the desert state prior to handing it the World Cup. And only a few of those knew that one club actually had already perfected a cooling technology in 2004, years before Qatar even thought of bidding for the World Cup.
What did transpire though, is a pretty devastating report that warned of health risks for athletes and visitors alike: after all, temperatures of 45 degrees and more are not unusual at this time of year – take a quick flight and see for yourself. Just like the FIFA president did a couple of weeks ago when he visited Jordan, Palestine and Israel.
And, quite appropriately, right after his visit, he attended a Beckenbauer PR event in some remote German village (or was it Austrian?), where, kindly supported by Kaiser Franz and the Bayern Munich top brass, he made an unexpected declaration: the 2022 FIFA World Cup must be held in winter. Who would have thought that?
There was much talk about that as soon as Qatar won the bid. Dressed in the uniform of a White Knight, Michel Platini was seen galloping into the limelight and promptly suggested that now that they had won the bid, Qatar should stage the World Cup in winter.
For whatever reason, the FIFA president was not inclined. And European Leagues were initially horrified. But the ranks kept breaking and opinions changing. The sole staunch fighters against winter games are the Premier League who foresee apocalyptic developments if the World Cup were moved to winter.
It would mess up their calendar for sure. It would also kill off some of the English League’s traditional matches around Boxing Day. It would create calendar havoc and fixture chaos. In brief: it would be impossible. But would it?
If FIFA – on its own or more likely upon a formal request by Qatar – were to decide that no matter what, the 2022 World Cup had to be played in winter, what exactly could anybody do about it? Frankly? Absolutely nothing.
All FIFA Members are held by the FIFA Statutes, the Rules and Regulations and the Laws of the Game. One of those dictums stipulates quite clearly that every Football Association that is a FIFA Member MUST release players for the FIFA World Cup. As simple as that. If they refuse, they can expect an instant ban from all international tournaments, be that within their own respective Confederation or FIFA competitions.
Add to that the fact that a vast majority of top class Premier League players are neither English nor British. I am not sure who would assume that Nigerians, Cameroonians, Senegalese, Brazilians, Colombians, Mexicans, Belgians, Dutch, Spaniards, Portuguese, Chinese, Koreans, Japanese, Australians or Italians (to name but a few nationalities) would rather be in conflict with their own country and NOT participate in a World Cup (and be banned from international matches forthwith) or accept reality, leave the Club and League that employs them, and go to Qatar.
Whether the Premier League agrees or not, it doesn’t really matter: it is FIFA’s World Cup and no rule or law states that it must be played in July. Which is also why FIFA’s ExCo would have a very warm time turning down a respective request by Qatar – one hears that there are several top legal opinions already available that make it quite clear, if Qatar were to ask for winter games, there would be no legal grounds for FIFA to deny that request.
Therefore, the Premier League can make lots of noise and be against this, that or the other. In the end, it will have to succumb to FIFA Law (by-laws, for that matter) and do as it’s told. And the more it bleats, the more likely international opinion will harden against it.
Secession then?
Hardly likely either. With UEFA’s president staunchly defending a winter World Cup, it is hard to see how UEFA would want to oppose football’s world governing body.
Case closed, or is it?
We shall all see, won’t we?