oldtype

The entire nation of Qatar will basically be one huge, sterile, air-conditioned convention center. That just about sums it up.

yeah, with the same kind of indentured servants (ie slaves) they use in Dubai. human rights disaster. as for the 2nd point, they probably will be doing something like that - which is not a positive - in fact it's a scandalous negative. imagine they'll be looking for young kids in africa, south america right now and paying their parents to ship them over aged 10/12 which is rather unscrupulous to say the least. I really wasn't trying to imply that these were actual positives

Looking at it from a positive light, they have twelve years and infinite money left over to build whatever the hell they want. Who cares if they don't have stuff right now, they could rebuild the entire country from the ground up if they wanted to. Heck, they could just buy off an entire town in Brazil right now and give all of the kids Qatari passports so they could play for them in 2022.

Nope, but Round 1 England knocked out. Round 2 Russia hit winning total of 12 points. Round 1, Aussies out Round 2 Japan out Round 3 Korea out Round 4 Qatar > USA for 2022

We were third for the 2022 bid apparently. Came a lot closer than I thought. Australia were eliminated first, which is surprising.

No football tradition = no atmosphere. Plus it's the size of a medium town, no way it can support all the people going there comfortably. This. It'll be worse than in South Africa imo. First of all, it's an absolute farce that they get to have the World Cup with zero footballing tradition. Absolutely none. The Qatari team doesn't even make the final round of Asian qualifiers, never mind the World Cup proper. They're idea of improving their national team is paying random Brazilians to take Qatari passports and play for them. Absolute abomination of a national team. The air conditioning idea WILL fail. They might have the stadia nice and frosty but tell that to the tens of thousands of fans who are going to be baking to death walking around/standing in line etc. Plus, we're talking about sticking the entire World Cup in a country that's one half the size of Wales here. Something is bound to be f***ed up. ...Funnily enough though, I'll probably still go to Qatar despite all the potential for disaster. No desire whatsoever to head over to Russia though. (Maybe if I get lucky and our group gets put in Vladivostok.)

At least we're absolutely clear on what the sole criteria is for selection is now. Suck a lot of FIFA cock = win

Well, at least it's not Japan I guess.

I wouldn't even mind going to Qatar, it's a great place for a vacation. But the notion of a World Cup there is the worst fucking idea ever. It would be like awarding whatever the equivalent is for Rugby to South Korea. They have no footballing tradition whatsoever.

Because I don't want to go there Were SA or Korea disasters? The Qatari bid is not even remotely comparable to either of those.

Probably reliable enough to not do a "Dewey defeats Truman" unless they were absolutely certain.

You needed more proof for that?

Russia and Qatar. Christ on a bike, everyone loses. What makes them think this would NOT be a disaster?

That lineup would have me depressed for the next fucking decade. Literally.

Ugh, please not Qatar

The fact that the vote is going long is probably good news for Qatar, Korea, or Japan.

Wasn't this known already? They hinted at it previously but obviously all the Asian bidders got furious and they formally said that they weren't looking at 2026. Then they spring this on us on the day of the vote. Well, I suppose hosting it is the only way they'll ever get to play at the finals again.

The Chinese just released an interview saying they'd be interested in 2026 a few hours ago, which is obviously a huge blow for all the AFC bids. Good to see that they still never miss a chance to be cunts.

Just had a look at a video for their proposed first five stadiums. They do look absolutely incredible; sights to really behold if they were ever constructed, but i just don't know. Qatar? It's not exactly a footballing nation. Haven't really paid any attention to these World Cup bids... who's are the best? Depends on your definition of "best." Japan pretty much gave up on this several months ago so they're as good as out. I don't think we've got a prayer either. So that leaves the US (safe option), Australia (the "historical significance" option), and Qatar (batshit insane option.) What complicates things is that while the US probably has the most votes right now, they won't be able to secure a majority for several rounds. There's a high possibility that Korea, Japan, and Qatar will unite behind whichever bid lasts the longest, which means one of the three could possibly sneak in if they randomly survive the first two votes.

The Qatar bid is a complete joke for so many reasons. I suppose that means they'll win it.

Screw rationality, if you were in my shoes, would you be going "yeah well twenty years seems too soon so I hope my own country fails."

Want: England, South Korea Will probably get: Russia, USA

In the end I think the presentations mean very little and are done for show more than anything else. There are only 22(24?) voters, all of them have been lobbied halfway to hell and have already decided to vote for whoever gave them the most jewelry/booze/whores by now. The presentations are much more pertinent for the IOC, when you have 200+ voters so you can't possibly lobby them all individually.

Bingo! That of course is the reason why it's an England only bid. Spain and Portugal at least have a track record of qualification and good performance in recent WC tourneys. By the same token it will be an absolute raving joke if Qatar get the WC without having even gotten into the final Asian qualification round for nearly a decade.

Not really as they're not in the same bid group, so it's a bit redundant claiming it'd be a joke if they got it when they're not up against the same competition. I'm aware they're not bidding against one another. Not sure how it's "redundant" either. Just commenting in general - England '66, USA '94, and Korea/Japan '02. Which of those three should get its next turn first? It's not about "turns." By that logic we should be awarding this to Russia and Qatar by default.