Another Poor World Cup Showing.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/9250585.stm

Am I the only person not to be heartbroken that we didn't win the right to host the 2018 World Cup. Granted it would have been nice but we already seem to have performed over and above the odds, kowtowing to FIFA delegates: criticising our own press who had the audacity to ask questions into corruption left rather an unpleasant taste. We have sent royalty and our prime minister over to massage the egos of some sports administrators and now that it has seen us pick up only two votes and be eliminated at the first hurdle it is all a little embarrassing. All I heard was that we had the best bid and so dark arts had been at play for this outcome, which may or may not have taken place but dismisses the merits of the other bids. The snobbery in maintaining we have the best stadia, league, fans and infrastructure ignores those of Spain and Portugal (the Bernabau, Nou Camp and Estadio da Luz aren't too shabby) as well as the added kudos of Spain being the World Cup (and Euro) champions. Personally I would have preferred our bid over theirs purely on a Bugggins Turn format as they held the tournament in 1982 to our 1966. For that reason I don't overly mind Russia winning the bid as they have never staged the tournament before and for all his daffy ideas Sepp Blatter does like to spread the football word as wide as he can. The trouble with that is he appears to just blindly award the tournament to football virgins in the hope of opening up new markets as best seen with Qatar winning 2022. Russia at least have some footballing pedigree if allowing for the USSR team which won the original European Championship in 1960 and has produced players such as Lev Yashin and Oleg Blochin. Cold War politics ensured no east European country has been a previous host and as the largest country in that area with the best league and bigger clubs it is not too much of a surprise. The surprise element came from Qatar which has no footballing pedigree that I am aware of and whilst that should not be a prerequisite as otherwise it becomes elitist it would be nice to think that they were investing in the sport and slowly trying to raise their profile as Japan, South Korea and South Africa all did rather than just throwing a load of money in FIFA's direction. Whilst it is nice to reward developing footballing nations (curiously in a report after the announcement this included the hosts for 2014: Brazil!) FIFA should not forget the traditional countries although the nature of the bid meant that of the countries applying for 2022 three have held it recently: USA in 1994 and Japan and South Korea jointly in 2002. This left Qatar and Australia and I personally would have gone for the latter on the basis that they have been slowly developing as a footballing nation appearing in the last two World Cups, ranked 20th in the world and have recent experience of hosting a major sporting event. The desire to actually stage it in Asia and in an oil rich country no doubt won over the delegates but while they will surely put on a fine spectacle it flies in the face of recent campaigns for gay footballers to come out when rewarding a country that bans homosexuality.
   When looking at our weak points hooliganism and the press were mentioned but the former is no longer a major issue and by no means exclusive to us and other countries have had their problems as well with e.g. Spain's fans not always being fully restrained when throwing pig's heads and chanting racist abuse. What it shows is that for all the talk in public, politics and money are the biggest deal breakers.