FIFA’s dreaming of a Brazil vs England Christmas

Four days since the 22nd FIFA World Cup Finals opened, trillions of words have already been said and written about who will win the most viewed sporting event on earth.

It’s too soon to say what the games played so far indicate. Saud Arabia’s victory over Argentina and Germany’s defeat by Japan has however belied predictions that the final outcome is largely predictable.

Anything seems possible in the 2022 World Cup.

But there is one certainty. FIFA is determined to come out on top.

Its first big challenge is defending the decision made 12 years ago to award the mandate to host the 2022 finals to Qatar, a Muslim country with a national population of not much more than 300,000.

The eight stadiums being used for the tournament could accommodate every citizen with room to spare. ?The Lusail Iconic Stadium where the final match will take place can comfortably hold every Qatari adult male.

It was impossible to hold the finals in the northern hemisphere’s summer even after Qatar promised its stadiums would be climate-controlled. The first match therefore kicked off on 20 November, when Qatar’s weather is comfortable even for high-intensity outdoor sport.

The event’s inauguration was partly overshadowed by charges that Qatar discriminates against gay and lesbian people (which is a fact) and is responsible for the deaths of more than 10,000 migrant construction workers (which is not).?Some fans complained they couldn’t buy alcohol in the stadiums.

FIFA responded by arguing that football is a world sport and it is time the finals were held in a Muslim state. Most low-income nations can’t spare the money needed to stage the event. Most people watch football at home on TV. The size of the population of the host country is essentially irrelevant.

It’s estimated that Qatar has spent more than $220bn on hosting the finals. But most of that is investment that was needed anyway in transport infrastructure and housing. The country is the world’s richest on a per capita basis and can afford it.

Nevertheless, FIFA’s reputation as one of the world’s most successful transnational organisations is at stake. It needs the Qatar finals to be a big success.

So its president Gianni Infantino will be hoping the number viewing the final game of the tournament on 18 December will at least match the 3.6bn who watched France beat Croatia to become World Cup champions in 2018.

If that happens, the 2022 finals will be a triumph for FIFA whoever wins on the pitch.

A compelling conclusion that will excite the world is required. That’s why FIFA may be dreaming of a Brazil versus England Christmas.

Brazil is the most successful national team in football history. It’s won the World Cup five times. Its players are legendary for skill and flair. They’ve got a stylish football costume that even people who don’t like or understand football can admire. And their fans are colorful and charming.

Only European and South American teams have won the World Cup. But Brazil’s multiethnic team seems to represent the entire planet.

Viewing figures will be bolstered by the country’s 214m population. And wouldn’t it be nice if the displacement last month of Brazil’s divisive president Jair Bolsanaro, notorious for palling up with former US president Trump, was followed by a unifying sixth triumph in Doha.

Having Brazil in the World Cup final can never be bad for viewing figures. But who should they face?

Ideally, it should be a team from Europe, football’s birthplace with a population of 750m people. It would be an intercontinental clash of the giants and a battle between the impecunious but rising Global South and the pampered ?North.

No one looks quite right for the great football game of nations that will be decided next month. Spain is overdue a World Cup victory and Germany is always a contender. European champions Italy, the other big-name European national team, didn’t make it to the finals. Their fans may be tempted to back Brazil instead.

But if I was infantino, I’d look elsewhere. Fifty-six years after winning the World Cup, England may fit the bill as the best way to get people glued to their TV sets in December.

Disliked for unskillful football, unattractive players, violent fans and an imperial history that is still resented in Africa and Asia, England was the choice of no one who wasn’t English -- until recently.

Its team is perhaps playing better football (who can tell?) and came second to Italy in last year’s European Championship. But what counts for FIFA is whether billions across the world now like them enough to watch them get to the final.

The answer is yes and for several reasons.

England team manager Gareth Southgate champions football as an inclusive sport for all. Half his team is young and black. Critically, almost all the England team play in the Premiership, the world’s most popular national football competition. Some are household names across the world.

England’s tournament got off to a great start with a 6-2 victory over Iran, which looks like being the tournament’s 2022 whipping boy.

Five of the team’s six goals were scored by black players including the saintly Marcus Rashford, a champion of Britain’s poor. England’s emerging hero is Jude Bellingham who scored the first with a majestic header. He’s 19, the son of a policeman and a member of the Borussia Dortmund team, runners-up in the Bundesliga last season and famed across Europe for playing entertaining football.

England in 2022 is an attractive team that FIFA’s commercial sponsors will like to see do well this year. ?

Hundreds of millions will enjoy watching it progress through the World Cup finals.

Even more will cheer for Brazil if England makes it to the final.

And that, whatever happens in the match, will be sweet music to FIFA’s ears.