Famous Last Words

Hot on the heels of my previous critcism of Sepp Blatter, I would now like to restore the balance a little.

The president of FIFA has given his backing to England and other European nations (god knows who though?) to bid for the 2018 world cup finals. This is despite the fact that according to the FIFA rotation system, the 2018 world cup should be heading to the concacaf region (USA or Mexico basically) in that year.

This chnage of heart is due to the poor bidding process for the 2014 finals in South America where only Brazil entered a bid with Argentina and Columbia pulling out of the running. This makes a mockery of the rotation system when there are so many countries crying out to stage what is the biggest sporting event on the planet.

It comes back to quotas again really. Technically Europe should have to wait until the 2022 finals but given the farcical nature of the 2014 bidding race, FIFA are looking to scrap the rotation system and base the bidding process on merit.

It certainly makes sense, but comes in stark contrast to the comments made by Mr Blatter regarding the introduction of a quota system for foreign players in the European leagues. This would remove merit from the equation and leave teams picking sub standard players in order to fill the legal requirements.

A little but of hypocrisy from Mr Blatter then perhaps? Maybe he is just trying to butter up the EU after his comments on the quota system, or perhaps I am just very cyncial? Either way, I am already looking forward to the prospect of an English bid for the 2018 finals – about bloody time too!