By AVI CREDITOR
The 2022 FIFA World Cup might just be played in the winter after all.
After a series of high-profile soccer personalities raised the possibility of scheduling the event in the winter to avoid the high temperatures of a Qatari summer, FIFA president Sepp Blatter offered a surprisingly revealing take on the matter, which will be discussed at FIFA's executive committee meeting in March.
"I expect it to be in the winter, because when you play football you must protect the main people, the players," Blatter said at a media event in Qatar.
A winter World Cup would be the first of its kind and, among other things, would affect the schedules of all major European domestic leagues.
Here are a few more stories to get you through your Friday:
BLATTER BLASTS IOC
In defending FIFA against allegations of corruption, Blatter compared the legitimacy and transparency of FIFA to that of the International Olympic Committee, saying that the IOC "has no transparency" and operates financially "like a housewife."
According to the Associated Press, Blatter said, "Our accounts are open to everyone. … The IOC does it like a housewife. She receives some money and she spends some money."
Blatter also reportedly is not going to be creating an anti-corruption commission as he had previously stated.
SPURS CLOSE IN ON BECKHAM
Tottenham manager Harry Redknapp said that his club is closing in on a loan deal for Los Angeles Galaxy midfielder David Beckham and that he hopes to have him with the team as soon as Sunday.
The loan would send Beckham to North London for two months, and he would return in time for the start of the Galaxy's regular season.
MLS ORIGINAL OKAFOR DIES
Uche Okafor, a former member of the Nigerian national team and an MLS original with the then-Kansas City Wiz/Wizards, was reportedly found dead at his Dallas home Thursday morning. He was 43 years old.
Okafor played in Kansas City from 1996 to 2000 and was on the Nigeria squad that captured the 1994 Africa Cup of Nations.
CREW LOSE JERSEY SPONSOR, ADD STRIKER
Glidden will no longer be the shirt sponsor for the Columbus Crew, ending its deal with the club that began in 2008, according to the Columbus Dispatch. The paint company still will sponsor the club, just not in the capacity as its reported $1 million jersey deal.
The Crew also announced the signing of striker Tom Heinemann, who scored 14 goals last season in his time with the Charleston Battery and Carolina RailHawks.
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What do you think about the possibility of a winter World Cup? What do you make of all of Blatter's comments? Think Beckham's loan is a good thing? Saddened by the news of Okafor's passing? What do you think of the Crew's announcements?
Share your thoughts below.
Good point. The WC in mid June-mid July is a pretty ideal slot for this country.
Didn’t we just technically have a World Cup in winter with another to follow in 2014? Just saying…
Blatter isn’t ruining football, the world is allowing him to do so. The idea of him running unopposed is shameful.
Exactly. This is bs of the highest order.
I am still outraged at the bid process that meant absolutely nothing. People spent a lot of time and money on that charade. It’s an insult to everyone who cared about USA Bid. Sepp Blatter seems a little ‘crazy’. I thought maybe he just doesn’t speak English well.. but there is something else going on there.
It could affect the price of the broadcast rights. FIFA makes alot of money from ABC/ESPN. Of course Blatter will give them to Al Jezeera which is based in Quatar.
So the major leagues are going to fit in 1) NT training camps, 2) warm-up friendlies, and 3) the actual World Cup itself into their mid-winter schedules (which is, oh yeah, the EPL’s busiest few weeks?!). Not to mention the fact that most people who wish to attend are going to have a hard time taking off of work for a few weeks in January.
This is absolutely ridiculous. Like others have mentioned, Qatar was voted the WC because, among other things, they’re going to throw incredible amounts of money into air-conditioned stadiums so that the games can be played in June/July. What happened to that? Yes, there is time for the leagues to rearrange themselves…but they shouldn’t have to. The World Cup is scheduled during the summer for a reason, because it’s easiest for the most people. You can’t just shift the timing of a league season that has been in place for generations and expect it to go off without a hitch.
The fact that Sepp Blatter is still in charge of FIFA after all of the crap that he has pulled astounds me. Sexist and corrupt he most certainly is, an idiot he most certainly is not considering the fact that he is keeping his job through all of this.
you make a good point jonk.. this is going to make qualifying start 6 months sooner which is definitely going to affect Euro 2020 qualifying! Blatter needs to think about how this will affect world soccer and not just his swiss bank account!
A lot of the USMNT on twitter got heat for saying this, but the World Cup in Qatar might just be the easiest way for their team to actually qualify…
Yellow for partisanship on a soccer blog!
As Blatter manages to come off as a sexist idiot…again. AWESOME.
100% agreed. Why award it to a place first and then take considerations for player health second? Poor decision FIFA.
Since no one has mentioned it, I’ll chime in with another concern about moving to winter: Qualifying and the draw. Normally the draw is 6 months ahead of the tournament. I imagine it would impact all the federations, but especiallly UEFA. They will definitely have to make some changes to squeeze qualifying in between Euro 2020 and whenever the draw is.
they better not only have a plan but start constructing these stadiums soon! i can imagine that a 60,000 seat indoor stadium with AC and all the training facilities that go with it will take some time to build and finance.
I really wouldn’t be surprised if Qatar does not pull it off.
blatter is the GW bush jr of football. horrible policies but hilarious to watch.
if Qatar has to build all these multi million dollar pitches why not make them domes.blatter is already trying to ruin football. why not go all the way?
Maybe someone should do a Brick and stap him in the heart with a Trident.
Uche Okafor also played in two World Cups and was coaching youth soccer with the ASG Group which is headed up by former Dallas Burn coach Dave Dir here in Texas.
RIP
+1
tells me that the decision for qatar was made long before the actual ‘vote’….
And let’s not forget that it the scheduling could happen at the height of our College American football bowl/NFL playoff season. Some of us, after all, enjoy both sports. Won’t that be fun for the major networks.
Wait until Qatar gets hammered 30-0 in their Bracket and Blatter announces that they will still advance at Englands expense to promote football in the middle east.
Exactly! The deal was you bid to host in the summer, not winter. If you can’t do that than don’t bid to host. You can’t change the plans to suit you after you’ve been awarded the bid. Summer or re-vote the bid.
Totally agree on this. Perhaps Qatar was able to over-promise what it could actually do in terms of cooling, since they probably knew all along that if it went to them it wouldn’t be played in the heat anyway.
“Don’t worry guys…we won’t have to actually develop all of these air cond. stadiums that are in our bid anyway because the good ol’ boys will just move it to January for us”
and then beckham… almost as dumb..
I agree with the statement above that here is plenty of time for the leagues to work out the details of a winter break to accommodate a Winter World Cup. For me, the real concern is with the stadia. Qatar has to know what kind of stadiums they’re building — climate-controlled, or not. If they’re going for the climate-controlled stadiums, they probably need a lot of lead time to figure the engineering, design and construction.
As I’ve written before, the stadiums are probably the least of the problematic questions in staging a Qatar cup in the summer months. I’d say that training facilities for 32 teams will be far more problematic — which is why I think it must be a Winter World Cup. I suppose it’s possible to put up bubbles over grass field for a short period, but it’s gonna get dicey. The stadiums, however will take so many years to build that FIFA cannot speculate about this endlessly. By the time of the Brazil Cup, they must decide.
wow..Sepp has really lost any sliver of sanity he ever had. must be drunk!
There’s a major problem though. Most people take long vacations in the summer. Taking 2 or 3 weeks off in January doesn’t work for most people especially Europeans that love their month long vacations at the end of summer.
On another note I don’t have a lot of time to even watch a world cup that are broadcast in the middle of the day in winter. I can get away with it in the summer. I guess I should just start planning for it now
Anyone know what’s up with Gino Padula?
BTW, anyone watching the Asian Cup?
Qatar is losing to Uzbekistan 2-0… woops
+1
That’s part of the plan, Jimmy. The fans are really just an annoyance, what with their demands of nonsense like stadia (which Qatar doesn’t have) to watch matches in and beer (which Qatar doesn’t allow) to drink. By placing the WC when Europeans and Americans are working instead of on summer break FIFA eliminates that problem.
who is also hilarious!
but you make good points about the promises kept/unkept stuff.
Unfortunately I have to disagree…Blatter is a corrupt genius…a moron would have lost control years ago.
This is the final straw though….time for US Soccer to join with England FA and flex some muscle.
I just don’t care anymore, as long as I can go to a pub/bar every other day for an hour or so during month in 2012 and forget who i am, where i am, and everything else that matters and truly be a kid and a fan again. You know, Fifa needs some praise for being able to do that for me.
I’ll say it: Thank you FIFA.
More sexist Blatter talk. I really wish FIFA had a different president; this guy is an embarrassment.
Blatter MUST GO!
I agree. This is something that should have been discussed before a vote, not after. Someone needs to go Ron Burgundy on Blatter and tell him, “Why don’t you go back to your home on Whore Island?”
This is insane!!! so all that noise about air conditioned stadiums and fan areas was just made up by some marketing people that have no idea what they are talking about?? FIFA either knew this or was too stupid and believed it.
Blatter is corrupt moron. Not only is he going back on his word that the World Cup in Qatar is going to be in the summer but he is also not going to create an anti-corruption commission! Federations around the world need to stand up to this clown!
This is BS, because alot of the honest voting was made on the fact on all the technology Qatar was going to invest into stadium cooling. If the propsal would have said that they are bidding for the WC but are proposing a change to have the WC in Winter, I doubt they would have gotten the support that they did and it would be harder to justify voting for Qatar for the guys who where on the take.
Instead of changing the time of the World Cup to accommodate Qatar, why not change the location to accommodate the WORLD? Is it FAIR PLAY to the European leagues and clubs that they will have to spend millions to reconstruct their schedules?
Blatter: There is no corruption, because I decided there’s no corruption.
And by the way, where’s my Nobel Prize?
Hmmm, I wonder if it will be over Christmas break, and if so, what all the players and coaches and administrators would think?
Man, it would be really really weird to watch the world cup in the winter! I am so used to watching in air conditioning and then going out and playing pick up in the sweltering heat….I’m sure I’ll be able to make the proper adjustments in 12 years time : )
The two most entertaining comments of the post? hahaha
According to the Associated Press, Blatter said, “Our accounts are open to everyone. … The IOC does it like a housewife. She receives some money and she spends some money.”
Blatter also reportedly is not going to be creating an anti-corruption commission as he had previously stated.
Well, I don’t know about anyone else but for me it is a lot easier to get time off from work in June than January. Just another reason to not go to the World Cup in Qatar.
Winter world cup sounds intriguing, and makes me much more likely to want to attend. Desire up from 1.5% to 15%-20%
“I expect it to be in the winter, because when you play football you must protect the main people, the players,” Blatter said at a media event in Qatar
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Yes because the protection of anyone, was clearly at thought when awarding this country.
Unrealistic as it may be, I sincerely hope clubs are able to create a strong enough opposition to the rescheduling and not let it happen in any manner available to them.
As far as I’m concerned, Blatter awarding this country should now have to suffer the consequences of such a decision and the fiasco it’s became and will be if it remains in the summer.
Why everyone else should be expected to alter their regular schedules is astoundingly arrogant and par for the course on this degenerate of a human being.
FIFA comes around to MLS’s schedule! Global Warming + Corruption = WIN!
Is it really Sepp Blatter or Jim Rome dressed up like Sepp Blatter? Sepp is ruining world football.
There is more than enough time to prepare for a winter World Cup in 2022. Many leagues have winter breaks that they can extend slightly and the leagues that play through the winter can start a little earlier and end a little later than normal.