As Australia rakes over its failed bid for the 2022 World Cup, the focus has fallen on Qatar, the nation that beat Australia to the right to host the tournament.
More specifically, dejected Australian fans and officials are asking how and why Fifa would choose to stage the 2022 World Cup in the tiny desert nation that boasts a population of just 1.6 million and where none of the planned stadiums are yet built. Players and fans will also be forced to endure sweltering conditions – in June and July, when the World Cup will be played, temperatures in Qatar regularly top 40 degrees.
By way of explanation, Jack Reilly of Football Federation Australia put it bluntly: “The Qatar delegation have been pushing money around for a long period of time.”
Indeed, cash will be no object for Qatar, who will now begin ploughing capital into their preparations for the tournament.
Incredibly, Qatar’s legacy plans involve dismantling their new stadiums and shipping them to countries with poor football infrastructure. The tournament’s main stadium will be the Lusail Stadium, with a capacity of 86,000, that will be surrounded by water. It will take four years to build but promises to be spectacular.
The International Monetary Fund deems Qatar to have the world’s fastest-growing economy and the Gulf state plans to spend $100 billion on infrastructure projects between now and 2015.
Given the vast oil wealth flowing through the country’s pipelines, the optimism of Qatar’s bid president Mohammed bin Hamad Al-Thani may prove well-founded. “We won’t let you down. You will be proud of us, proud of the Middle East,” he said.
One enormous difference for players and fans compared to any previous World Cup will be the issue of travel. Qatar is the smallest nation to stage the World Cup since Uruguay in 1930, with 10 out of its 12 stadiums located within a 30-kilometre radius.
