So, after all the efforts, the expenditure, the compliments and the expectations, England will not get the World Cup in 2018. Neither will they get it in 2022. They can try again for 2026 at the earliest. But why bother? They failed so resolutely in this case that we have to suspect that we will never get the World Cup unless either we are the only bidder or FIFA is drastically reorganised. There have been one or two hiccups along the way in getting our bid together but at the end of the day we presented a very professional proposal, generally acknowledge as the best "technical bid". In Zurich it was supported by the heir to the throne, the Prime Minister and David Beckham as well as many of the organising team. On the day of their final presentation all three of the final team leaders did a good job. We have all the stadiums necessary for the event; there is immense interest in football in the UK; and the country would have organised the event very professionally. But in the first round of voting we collect just two votes and we were immediately eliminated. In round 2 Russia got over 50% of the votes and they were awarded the contest. I have to admit that I am not heart-broken but I do believe we were screwed. FIFA is an odd autocracy that has had Ssep Blatter at its head for 30 years. There have been many accusations of corruption - some of them proven - and both the British press and the BBC have reported on serious concerns yet FIFA is too arrogant to even investigate. If any of the allegations are even half right, we have to wonder whether the British PM and the heir to the throne should be dealing with them at all. It has been suggested that the Panorama programme on Monday alleging corruption should have been suppressed. On what moral grounds can we sustain an argument that corruption should be suppressed in order that senior figures in the British establishment should be able to deal with any persons or organisation unrestricted by any suggestion of corruption - even when they may well suspect it to be true. It is ironic that the event has been awarded to Russia - a country, which has itself been accused of having a less than open and uncontaminated government. They may have done nothing wrong in this case but I am sure that I will not be the only one suspicious of some kind of collusion when England was eliminated so quickly. It may just be, of course, that the secretive group that is FIFA just did not want anyone suggesting that they were not entirely honest - no matter whether it were true or not.
I do hate these bidding processes. In many ways they are obscene. In this case four countries or groups of countries have wined, dined, courted and fawned over a group of officials while spending about £20 million each to put forward their proposals only to find that for all but one everything was a complete waste. Here we have a world with poverty, corruption, deprivation, starvation and disease and £60 million is casually thrown down the drain in order to persuade a group of highly paid carpet-baggers that this or that country is best able to organise a few football matches. The World Cup is a sports event that could take place in any relatively rich country - and in some cases the locals may even have a big interest in the Game. Still it is not so nonsensical - at least in England's case - as spending £35 million in order to be allowed to chuck £10 billion down the drain staging 2½ weeks of school sports known as the Olympic Games.
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