One of the several desires of any football nation is to play in and most importantly host the ‘Greatest Show on Earth’ - the FIFA World Cup. That was the case with Qatar, a nation with a population of approximately 2.9 million people, and even though the country faced strong criticisms when they were selected to host the 22nd edition of the FIFA World Cup, the Middle Eastern country finally got its wish.
However, the selection process for Qatar was as challenging and laborious as the country’s start to the 2022 World Cup campaign. The extremely humid weather during the November – December period coupled with the reports of human rights abuse and exploitation of migrant workers seemed to foreshadow Qatar’s fortunes at this World Cup.
Football embodies togetherness and unity, therefore, using Qatar to host one of the greatest sports represented two sides of a coin. But was it the right decision? It was reported by the Economic Times that Qatar spent an estimated $200 billion, which was 16 times higher than the 2018 World Cup in Russia. This coupled with a story by CNN where the Qatar world chief, Hassan Al-Thawadi, announced that around 400-500 migrants lost their lives while completing work on projects connected to the tournament, begged the question of whether hosting it in Qatar was the best option.
As hosts, Qatar opened the tournament against the South American country of Ecuador, which had a population of over 17 million citizens. Their dream start was sadly cut short when the 44th-ranked team opened the scoring against the 50th-ranked team within 3 minutes. Fortunately for Qatar, (or was it?) VAR ruled the goal as offside. A call that brought the controversial technology into action - just in case some might have forgotten about its addition to the world of football since March 3, 2018. A player could be offside by millimetres and the technology would spot that in an instant, disallowing the goal. However, some complaints have been aired that it lacks consistency and accuracy, hindering the game's flow.
Qatar’s first match ended 2-0 against Ecuador. Overall Qatar had 5 attempts, but none were on target compared to Ecuador’s 6 shots and 3 on target. Ecuador outclassed them in every other statistic. No host nation had lost its opening match – but Qatar came and took that headline. Some of the 67,372 fans who had joined the team for this historic first match at Al Bayt Stadium had dispersed by the second half, leaving multiple empty seats.
And to make matters worse, they became the second host country to crash out of the group stage – South Africa did back in 2010 – after losing their first two matches against Ecuador and Senegal both with a two-goal difference. However, they managed to score in the Senegal match that ended 3-1; the lone goal-scorer for Qatar was Mohammed Muntari. A bittersweet moment surely for the 29-year-old.
Qatar once again made harsh history by being the lone host country to lose two matches in a single group stage of the World Cup. As one would have imagined, not a dream World Cup for the first-time entrants. Their final match against the Netherlands on November 29, by way of formalities as they were already out of the competition, ended 2-0 and Qatari footballers had their last hurrah on their home ground.
As is the world of football, Qatar Football Association decided on December 30 to call it quits with coach Felix Sanchez after failing to register a point from group games at the World Cup. His contract was expected to expire by December 31 but this step was not surprising. However, Felix’s remarks were uncharacteristically surprising as the coach had been with the team in Qatar since 2006 and had taken the team to training camps in Europe months before in preparation for this tournament. He remarked, “We never thought at any time to set a target of reaching the last 16 or the quarterfinals. We just wanted to come here and see what we could do”.
Was he following John Lubbock’s quote, “Aim for the stars and maybe you will reach the sky”? Because even though Qatar crashed out, they did get their wish of hosting the World Cup and they did receive forms of recognition for their attempts to be the first carbon-neutral World Cup (which I dare say did not seem to live up to its standards based on reports of emissions from the increased flights and the newly built stadiums). On the other hand, you just would expect a little more conviction from a team’s head coach, maybe it would have been shown in Qatar’s game.
Nonetheless, one statistic that can revive Qatar’s spirit was the BBC poll that was done, which said Qatar 2022 was the best World Cup of the century outclassing its rivals of 2010 and 2014 by 78%. Arguably many will attribute it to a fairy-tale ending for Messi and Argentina, who despite losing their first match went on to become victors against defending champions, France, in the finals.
Not bad Qatar, I guess. Now on to the next.
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