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London is hurting at the award of the 2018 World Cup to Russia.
When someone rejects you, you can do one of two things. Prove them wrong or prove them right. No-one can dispute the technical excellence of their bid. Certainly the FIFA Technical Committee gave it the highest marks, with Russia and Qatar’s bids, receiving the lowest.
Among the many reasons being quoted why FIFA dared to select a bid other than England’s was the perceived arrogance the FA appears to hold towards everyone else. It’s also fair to say the English media’s unwillingness to stay silent about FIFA corruption did not help.
Dorchester is one of London’s leading hotels
In England, it is naturally the latter that has received much of the blame.
Which is why, this morning’s news is revealing as it is embarrassing as it is hilarious.
Boris Johnson, the Mayor of London, has announced that he has withdrawn the offer of free hotel accommodation to FIFA delegates during the 2012 London Olympics. His reason is that they didn’t give the World Cup to England.
Let’s start in the less obvious place than the fact that this revelation portrays the City of London, and probably the entire nation, as juvenile and petty. What next, London defriends Football on Facebook?
Let’s start here instead.
Why were those heroic battlers against corruption, the English FA, offering free hotels to FIFA delegates during the bidding process? Like almost everything creeping out about this process after the fact, it seems that England’s main gripe is that everything they tried (good or bad), the Russians did better.
Last week, we revealed that they were pointing accusatory fingers at the USA’s Chuck Blazer among others. Blazer apparently promised England he would back their bid and then didn’t.
The FA conveniently forgot, during their high pitched whining about betrayal, about their promise to back the German bid in 2006 – a promise they subsequently went back on – and actually competed with the Germans. The deal had been that each would back each other’s bid’ England for EURO 1996 and Germany’s for the 2006 World Cup.
The Germans kept their word and England organised a highly successful tournament (which the Germans eventually won).
It was so good that the FA decided to bid against Germany in EURO 2006 despite the agreement. UEFA was furious, and the betrayal left the FA few friends.
See: Source of England’s Votes Should Douse Righteous Anger – Why England’s Bid Really Failed
Still the FIFA delegates were offered junkets to the London Olympics. Free hotel rooms for VIP guests during the Olympics are the province of by Locog, the Olympic organising committee. The delegates were offered rooms at the very expensive and plush Dorchester Hotel.
According to the BBC, Mayor Johnson is understood to have discussed the issue with Locog chairman, and former Olympic Gold medalist Sebastian Coe. Johnson traveled to FIFA headquarters in Zurich, Switzerland to assist England’s bid. There can be no claim that the England 2018 Bid were unaware of the offer.
It seemed while decrying corruption when they lost the vote, that bid was happy to offer inducements to secure the votes during the process. That’s bad enough, but Johnson has now followed the failure to win the World Cup with a tantrum, to add to the excruciatingly idiotic admission that he was at the bribery game too.
FIFA delegates were said to be furious at the Panorama program, “FIFA’s Dirty Secrets”, which exposed several instances of bribes and inducements given to FIFA delegates to win lucrative contracts. The four accused in the programme will be permitting themselves a rueful chuckle this morning.
A former Conservative MP, Johnson may have obtained a cheap populist headline for himself this morning among an English public still largely angry and bewildered as to why they got so few votes. He is known for it. This is the man who also threatened to arrest George W Bush for war crimes if the former President arrived in London to promote his book.
But away from conclusions about Johnson’s occasional tendency to put his foot in his mouth, his outburst has prompted another question.
What else did the England bid offer voting delegates?
And maybe this one, what else can they do to turn everybody else against them?
Time Magazine profile of Boris Johnson
8 Comments
Why should England continue to lick FIFA’s collective arse anymore? All the hard work, money and schmoozing/ass-kissing spent by England on the 2018 WC bid accomplished nothing but humiliation in front of the entire planet. There is plenty to knock the English for in football but no other entity has done more to spread the game throughout the world than the Premier League. Which ironically as you well understand, is not run by FIFA. If the rich(is this now more obvious than ever!)and crooked douchebags that run world football want to come watch the Olympics then they should pay for the privilege like everybody else does.
Trust me I am not that naive to believe they will even bust out a single shekel for their week regardless of Boris’ boot!
Your Scottish roots are showing Matey and I’m surprised and a wee bit disappointed that you didn’t scroll further down the Daily Mail this morning and decide to run a story on Dalglish calling for Scotland to host the WC now that the paradise that is Qatar got 2022
Cheers
I don’t read the Daily Mail of course. But Dalglish has a point. Scotland is just like Qatar. It’s 45 degrees in the summer.
Only Fahrenheit.
Yeah but the counter point to that is…Fuck’em.
While I agree with the article I am happy all of this is happening because I really want a good old-fashioned sh*t storm. I have always hated FIFA and even if I think this is all sour grapes I love every minute of it. I hope they set the dogs loose on them and we have many excellent scandals to read about in the coming years. This is shaping up to be a very entertaining soap opera.
Is it a necessary business expense spent to secure a business deal or bid contract. Or is this another bribe/corrupt attempt offered by the English FA that fell short of the offers given to Russia during the bidding process. Seams to me the whole process needs to be changed as the rules are not clear enough to keep unethical behavior out of it, and the financial gains and inducement to great. The voting pool is too small, the rules unclear, the financial gain to great, and the integrity of the process for securing a winning bid are all subject a better way of doing things.
I don’t mind the trashing of England, but it’s very difficult to sympathize with FIFA right now. The corruption likely extends well beyond free hotel rooms during sporting events, and there are quotes from a former executive committee member bemoaning England’s alleged unwillingness to really wade into the quid pro quo.
I just always like to watch England implode. They go in to everything with the highest expectations then before the event begins they start analyzing why they lost. Afterwards they sulk like a child who just lost dropped his ice cream and blames everyone else.
When it comes to dealing with FIFA, “petty and childish” works for me.