48-team Qatar World Cup only possible if Doha agrees

Published on Friday, 18 January , 2019 436 Views

Sport

#Bahrain #Doha #FIFA

Any decision by FIFA to increase the 2022 World Cup to 48 teams will only be made in agreement with hosts Qatar, a senior Gulf tournament organiser said Wednesday.

Boursa Kuwait ‘confident’ of MSCI upgrade, says CEO

Boursa Kuwait is “confident” that MSCI will upgrade it to emerging market status in 2019, according to CEO…

Nasser al-Khater, talking to journalists in Doha, said at the moment the country was continuing to prepare for a 32-team tournament in three years’ time.

“No decision will be made without the agreement of Qatar, this is an important point,” he said. “It will be a joint decision.”

He added: “We are waiting for the results of the feasibility study, and once they are ready, (FIFA) will share them with us… to see if it is possible”.

FIFA is carrying out the study into increasing the number of teams by 16 in 2022 and will announce a final decision in March.

Last month FIFA president Gianni Infantino said in Doha that a “majority” of football federations supported the increase.

Any decision to extend the tournament would though be faced by huge logistical and political problems.

The Qatar World Cup, the first in the Middle East, will take place over 28 days in November and December 2022, not the usual 32.

Officials have said previously that is not possible for Qatar to change the number of days, so one option would be to host tournament games across the region with neighbouring states.

But that is complicated by Qatar being at the centre of the worst diplomatic crisis to hit the Gulf in years.

Since June 2017, it has been politically and economically isolated in a rancorous diplomatic dispute with former allies, including Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and Bahrain.

A 48-team World Cup is set to become the norm from 2026, when the World Cup will take place in the USA, Mexico and Canada.

Walima Doha launches all-new Saturday sundowner sessions

Mondrian Doha, Qatar’s leading destination from global lifestyle hospitality company sbe, is pleased to announce the launch of…

Keywords: Bahrain Doha FIFA
Category Sport | 2019/01/18 latest update at 4:00 AM
Source : Sport 24 | Photocredit : Google

437 Views
Comments Add comment

Prada | Pre-Fall 2019 + Fall/Winter 2019/20...

What’s the future of gene editing? |...

Jim Acosta fires back at Trump’s media...

The editorial staff of Qatar Today would like to give all of its readers from Gulf and Qatar and the whole world the opportunity to participate actively in the development of the website! If you have something interesting, fun, scandalous - just something worth to be seen from more people. Capture it and share it in the Qatar Today with a short text.

Do you have information you want to reach our readers?

Send article/s

You can subscribe to our Facebook, Twitter and Google pages or use our RSS feed channel to always read the most important news about Qatar, the Gulf and the world.