Qatar ‘Doesn’t Have Football’ – Zico

Zico has rubbished Qatar’s prospective
World Cup, claiming the event should
not be held “in a country that doesn’t
have football”.
Former Brazil international Zico has
rubbished Qatar’s prospective World
Cup, claiming the event should not be
held “in a country that doesn’t have
football”.
Qatar infamously won the right to host
the 2022 World Cup in 2010, with
widespread claims of corruption
surrounding the Asian country’s bid.
Global frustration with Qatar’s tarnished
victory and ongoing stories of
construction workers losing their lives in
the process of building World Cup
stadiums in the Middle Eastern kingdom
provided a platform for Prince Ali bin
Hussein to challenge Sepp Blatter for the
FIFA presidency last week.
Zico is similarly unimpressed with
Qatar’s mandate to host the World Cup,
with the mass arrests amongst FIFA’s
elite prompting the FC Goa coach to call
for a new bidding process for the next
two World Cups.
“With respect to Qatar as a country that
wants to grow, you can’t have a World
Cup in a country that doesn’t have
football,” Zico said.
“You cannot change the fact that all of
the world is used to seeing a World Cup
for one single country. Why does this
country have that strength?
“I worked there [Qatar] when I was
Iraq’s head coach. They don’t have 1,000
people at their stadiums. There are
matches where not even the players’
families go.”
With the United States Department of
Justice’s investigation into FIFA – which
threw last week’s FIFA Congress into
turmoil and has prompted Blatter to
announce his resignation as president –
casting severe doubt on Russia’s bid for
the 2018 World Cup and Qatar’s for
2022, Zico believes those events cannot
go ahead.
“If the irregularities are proven that
there was buying of votes for this
nomination, I think that, no matter who
did it, we should stop and start over
again, make a different kind of
election,” he said.
“We have time. We have here different
countries, England is one of them with
infrastructure to hold a World Cup.
“This happened already 1986, if I
remember correctly as Colombia failed
and Mexico was there and made a great
World Cup.”
Zico has claimed he could lead FIFA but
insists he will only stand for election as
president “if the rules of the game
change”.