Qatar World Cup Investigation: Imagine if Australia Won 2022 Bid, a Sports-Mad Country Wanting to Put on Party
Imagine a World Cup in an honest, welcoming, sports-mad country, whose emerging football league would be transformed by local stadia hosting global superstars. Imagine a World Cup where organisers are motivated primarily by a desire to put on a great party for the world. Imagine a World Cup in Australia.
Australia bid for the right to host 2022 but were outmuscled by Qatar, who won by a bizarre landslide, ahead of the United States, South Korea and (separately) Japan at the Dec 2, 2010 vote in Zurich. It was laughable that such a serious bid as Australia should finish last. It summed up Fifa’s tainted voting system that the most legitimate bid went out in the first round. It is no surprise that half of the 22 ExCo members involved have since stepped down, some of them totally discredited. This was the vote that probity forgot.
Let us take the alternatives to 2022. The US, for all its magnificent arenas and powerful media, have staged the competition before as have South Korea and Japan. The competition should be pioneering, pushing back the boundaries. Qatar could not be taken seriously from a footballing perspective; there could be no serious footballing legacy from holding the event in such an artificial environment. No integrity.