Welcome to the World Cup gravy train. Gianni Infantino is trying to turn the World Cup finals into a school sports day. The new FIFA boss has successfully masterminded the increase from 32 to 48 teams for the 2026 FIFA World Cup. I assume each participant will get a medal and probably a gift pack from some despicable company that affiliates itself every four years with the World Cup.
By Matty Lawrence
To think, our beloved sport has been called “the beautiful game” for decades. It’s no real surprise that this Infantino-borne plan has prevailed: let’s be honest, which smaller nation wouldn’t vote in favour of the 12 countries’ increase?
Maybe it is too easy for me to sit here in my aloof position of being a citizen of a country that regularly qualifies, and castigate FIFA’s decision. But I’m quite at ease with the notion that the WC should actually be decreased in size to 24 countries. Six groups of four and bish-bash-bosh. You can bet your life that England would struggle to qualify for that tournament, but it wouldn’t bother me one iota.
As Martin Samuel wrote eloquently in The Daily Mail earlier in the week, the clue is in the title: World Cup FINALS. The preceding two years of qualifying are there to cut the wheat from the chaff, not the bloody finals themselves.
Infantino Dilutes The World Cup
Infantino has overseen a dilution of the World Cup for purely monetary reasons and his own personal gain: “fellate” the smaller nations and you instantaneously secure a greater number of votes than if you did the opposite and pandered to the larger football nations. Gianni Infantino secures his position at the head of FIFA and boosts the coffers of that trusty Swiss bank account. Jobs a good ‘un. The loser: the WC as a spectacle.
Does Size Matter?
Of course, I understand that smaller nations are at a disadvantage because they have fewer footballers to choose from. As one of the most avid England supporters in New York, I seem to recall that population size didn’t do a great deal of harm to Iceland. And it wasn’t so long ago that Greece were winning the European Championships.
With the right structure in place, smaller nations can achieve a modicum of success and, without being too patronising, for that they should be applauded. But a solid structure for a smaller nation’s football success, of course, requires money. This is the route Infantino should be going down instead of metaphorically trying to buy votes with his increase of nations at the 2026 WC.
Is FIFA Ruining The World Cup?
How about FIFA pass around the cash more liberally to smaller nations and oversee changes in the structure of football around the world? I don’t mean hand out the cash automatically to the heads of nations’ FA’s, I mean actually go into smaller countries with stringent guidelines and set about improving football from grass roots all the way through to the professional game.
The concept really isn’t a difficult one, but it will require money and patience: the former we know FIFA has plenty of, but doesn’t like liberally splashing about, and the latter it really does not have. Finally rescued from the fraudulent hands of Sepp Blatter, football now seems to have fallen into the lap of another megalomaniac intent on ruining the World Cup. I, for one, hope that in the forthcoming three finals of 2018, 2022, and 2026, the World Cup isn’t ruined immeasurably.
As a small aside, I just wanted to share with you the fact that this is my first column coming to you directly from the streets of NYC. I moved here last month after falling out of a Brexit-riddled England and straight into the arms of Donald Trump. Now I see what a few of my old coaches were getting at when they said that too many of my runs to the back post were mistimed.
I feel in these narcissistic times that envelop us, it was the right time to move to New York City: what better metaphorical flick of the hair in front of the mirror is there than being able to sit in the soccer bars of the city and read my column in First Touch.