2022 World Cup Qatar thread

Samid

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We (the fans) need to boycott it completely, otherwise nothing will happen.
I've been hearing calls for boycotting the Sotchi/Rio/Pyeongchang Olympics, Brazil and Russia World Cups and now this one. Yet when the events come around they are consumed like never before. Talk is cheap.
 

andyox

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Only way this will happen is if some major nations/broadcasters pull out. I'm a bit apathetic towards international football, but the first big team to pull out of the tournament gets a massive fecking thumbs up from me.
I think the challenge for FIFA is they would be on the hook for massive compensation surely? They've awarded the WC to Qatar and Qatar have already spent billions building the stadiums. On broadcasters, as far as I know, these rights have already been sold by FIFA (I'm living in US at the moment and I know NBC have already bought the rights). So again, not sure where things would stand if NBC (and other broadcasters) now turned round and said they were pulling out of contracts. Presumably they'd lose a lot of money so I don't know if that's realistic?

Just to be clear, I don't think Qatar should've won it. The opportunity to avoid a Qatar WC was not to award it to them in the first place. Now that it has been awarded, in clearly corrupt circumstances, it's going to be very messy to try to get out of it. FIFA would have to admit that it was awarded in corrupt circumstances, and given that they were the main beneficiary of that corruption, I don't know if I trust corrupt FIFA turkeys to vote for Xmas?!
 

Hughie77

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I know there having fertilizer for there pitches because I make it and sent it out there last January. Now we will send them the biostimulant for the grass to grow quicker and stronger, haven't heard when it's going but it will.
Same stuff we send to UTD, along with a load of others.
 

Stookie

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Fifa doing their best to destroy a great thing because of greed. Just more pigs with their snout in the trough of cash.
 

FootballHQ

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Guess it will happen if it's going to a vote.

Have little interest in this WC tbh, just will feel like artifical tournament to me instead of the great contest it always is.
 

Mrs Smoker

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Screw the qualifiers, let them all play! Imagine the clash of titans! St Kitts vs Nepal or the eternal rivals Malta vs Aruba!
Would be nice, but bordering on impossible.

More like Denmark v Ecuador or USA v Ghana. Teams that happen to qualify before as well.
 

Mrs Smoker

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This is for 2026

AFC (Asia) – eight places (up from 4.5)
Caf (Africa) – nine places (up from 5)
Concacaf (North and Central America) – six places, of which three go to hosts (up from 3.5)
Conmebol (South America) – six places (up from 4.5)
OF-C (Oceania) – one place (up from 0.5)
Uefa (Europe) – 16 places (up from 13)
 

Cal?

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This is for 2026

AFC (Asia) – eight places (up from 4.5)
Caf (Africa) – nine places (up from 5)
Concacaf (North and Central America) – six places, of which three go to hosts (up from 3.5)
Conmebol (South America) – six places (up from 4.5)
OF-C (Oceania) – one place (up from 0.5)
Uefa (Europe) – 16 places (up from 13)
Utterly idiotic distribution of places, everyone in the world awarded more places for being shit at football
 

Allas8

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Hope for 2026 World Cup we can go straight for 64 teams. Europe, Africa and Asia all get 16 team each, while America get put into 1 region with 15 teams qualifying and Oceania takes the last spot.

No lack of quality in Africa, as the 1-20 ranked teams are matched quite evenly. In America the 10 South American teams are just going to take up 10/15 spots. In Asia we might see Vietnam, Thailand or Philippines qualify, that would be something.
 

RoyH1

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It's getting too late to move the tournament. Looks like it will be in Qatar after all.
It would take something absolutely cataclysmic to prevent it at this stage. Firm evidence of corruption and bribery during the bid process wouldn't be enough.
 

Spiersey

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Yep, just coming to post this.

“PSG boss Al-Khelaifi charged with athletics corruption.”

Shit’s gotta hit the fan for these state sponsored sides at some point.
It'll be interesting to see if it has any repercussions for PSG. I'm unsure if other countries/UEFA have anything similar to the FA's 'Fit and Proper' test. It's hard to envisage any scenario where he can possibly be allowed to be involved with football in the short term when he is charged with corruption within another sport.
Obviously theres been scenarios in the past where the fit and proper test has been a bit of a joke, but I'm fairly sure he would be removed from an English side after this.
 

MalBot

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This is for 2026

AFC (Asia) – eight places (up from 4.5)
Caf (Africa) – nine places (up from 5)
Concacaf (North and Central America) – six places, of which three go to hosts (up from 3.5)
Conmebol (South America) – six places (up from 4.5)
OF-C (Oceania) – one place (up from 0.5)
Uefa (Europe) – 16 places (up from 13)
It is getting ridiculous. A lot of group games will become just a thrashing, a non contest as a sporting event. But hey, it is all good cos more money will be made by getting a new country in their first ever world cup. No one seems to care about the 10-0 score line that just happened.
 

Spiersey

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It is getting ridiculous. A lot of group games will become just a thrashing, a non contest as a sporting event. But hey, it is all good cos more money will be made by getting a new country in their first ever world cup. No one seems to care about the 10-0 score line that just happened.
I initially thought the same as you but when you think about it properly I don't think that would be the case.
Football is developing in the poorer countries more and more. Asia can put forward Australia, Japan, South Korea, Qatar and Iran as very strong sides. Syria are decent as well currently as are Saudi. That's 7 sides that wouldn't get hammered. China are improving also.

Africa can easily put forward 9 solid enough sides. They go in phases though in terms of who is good at the time but on the whole they would certainly have 5/6 teams who would have a chance at going through the groups, if not more.

Concacaf have Mexico, USA and Canada who would be fine. After that it is a bit of a push. 6 places would be too much for them, unsure if they would have that much though if they weren't hosts? 4/5 is probably fair for them. Costa Rica are occasionally okay, usually theres the big 3 + 1 other doing well at any one time. Additional sides from this Confed are probably most likely to be the weakest of any added sides. Panama a decent indicator I guess. Fortunate to qualify instead of USA and got hammered. Would probably be a common theme with 3 additional spaces.

South America is pretty straight forward, easily the hardest of any qualifying phase.

I'm not a fan of extending the number of places but I don't think it'll lessen the quality that much. It will detract from the competition though as groups of 3 sounds awful to me.
 

MalBot

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I initially thought the same as you but when you think about it properly I don't think that would be the case.
Football is developing in the poorer countries more and more. Asia can put forward Australia, Japan, South Korea, Qatar and Iran as very strong sides. Syria are decent as well currently as are Saudi. That's 7 sides that wouldn't get hammered. China are improving also.

Africa can easily put forward 9 solid enough sides. They go in phases though in terms of who is good at the time but on the whole they would certainly have 5/6 teams who would have a chance at going through the groups, if not more.

Concacaf have Mexico, USA and Canada who would be fine. After that it is a bit of a push. 6 places would be too much for them, unsure if they would have that much though if they weren't hosts? 4/5 is probably fair for them. Costa Rica are occasionally okay, usually theres the big 3 + 1 other doing well at any one time. Additional sides from this Confed are probably most likely to be the weakest of any added sides. Panama a decent indicator I guess. Fortunate to qualify instead of USA and got hammered. Would probably be a common theme with 3 additional spaces.

South America is pretty straight forward, easily the hardest of any qualifying phase.

I'm not a fan of extending the number of places but I don't think it'll lessen the quality that much. It will detract from the competition though as groups of 3 sounds awful to me.
You are correct that it is possible for most continents to be able to send reasonably solid teams. Apart from Concacaf, who I feel don't have any solid sides apart from maybe 3 countries. Like you said though even though there could be a lot more countries being able to be competitive in all of the other continents, it happens in phases.

Even with the current number of teams you still see a few thrashings in every World cup. By inviting teams weaker than those it is only natural it is more likely to happen more often. While in theory for example you could name 7 solid from Asia in practice it is not likely there will be more than 4 decent sides at any given time. Saudi is usually one of the stronger teams there and they have been on a few hammerings in recent World cups.

But football is developing nicely in traditionally non football countries so maybe soon we will have a lot more solid sides all over the world. I just feel we should wait untill that happens (when for example the lowest ranked teams in their continent regularly give the better teams in a World cup a game, rather than how it is now, a procession almost).
 

FootballHQ

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Concacaf is weak as a whole but its countries usually perform well once at WC. Mexico always get to last 16, Costa Rica were the surprise package of 2014 edition and US were improving until their shock failure to make the last one, got to knock outs in 2010 and 2014.

It's a big 3 but they do make more impact once at WC than African teams constantly falling in the group stages or Asian teams which can be hit and miss.

I can understand the argument for allowing more in to improve regions but equally there's a danger of stagnation. Take Australia. Were terrific in the 2006 WC due to the strongest generation they've ever had but since then just slipped back to being also rans. 48 will mean they'll be at every tournament regardless of who good their selection is so less desire to improve areas with the money rolling in.

Threat of actually missing a WC can give a jolt to nations to get their act together and this happen for Holland, Italy and US by missing the last one.
 
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Klopper76

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The Asian qualifiers have been announced.


North Korea will be a hell of an away day for the south.
 

Sassy Colin

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They are having the World Athletics Championships in Qatar at the moment.

Guess what, it's too hot! They are starting the marathon after midnight and it's still 32C and humid.

The stadiums are almost empty too.

Great venue for a prestigious sporting event, is Qatar.
 

Sir Scott McToMinay

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Such greed and vanity, cannot wait till petroleum becomes useless and all these nobodies who created feck all other than finding oil in their backyard stop having any world influence.
 

McGrathsipan

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Such greed and vanity, cannot wait till petroleum becomes useless and all these nobodies who created feck all other than finding oil in their backyard stop having any world influence.
In fairness when the oil runs out we've all got serious problems. Football wont be one of them
 

Sir Scott McToMinay

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Yeh, bloody Middle East! Never produced anything useful! ...
That’s not what I’ve said chief, you should work for the sun with that click bait shite.
These people are not getting any respect for me for finding some oil in their backyard.

Go read about the atrocities committed during the preparation for this damned WC, but looks like anything besides the success of your plastic club isn’t important.
 

sammsky1

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That’s not what I’ve said chief, you should work for the sun with that click bait shite.
These people are not getting any respect for me for finding some oil in their backyard.
I don’t think they are that bothered
 
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