Qatar has urged the world community to shun its fears of awarding the FIFA World Cup finals to the Middle East, a region that has never hosted football’s greatest event.
In an interview with BBC,
H E Sheikh Mohammed bin Hamad Al Thani, Chairman of the Qatar 2022 Bid Committee, said Qatar’s compact World Cup bid was an easy proposition for any travelling football fan.
“We are off the heels of a world recession. People are more concerned about spending money. We don’t want the fans to book three different hotel rooms, in three different cities for one week or two weeks to try and catch as many matches,” Sheikh Mohammed told BBC in an interview posted on the corporation’s official website.
“What we are saying is you need one air ticket in, one hotel room and you can watch up to three matches a day. It is possible, at least one to two. It is definitely a possibility,” Sheikh Mohammed explained.
Last month, a six-member FIFA inspection team — headed by Harold Mayne-Nicholls — visited Doha to see the football infrastructure, get a feel of the layman’s interest in the game and the cooling technology that Qatar says will provided solutions to all heat-related issues.
Qatar is one of nine countries bidding to host the 2018 or 2022 World Cup finals. Qatar, bidding only for the 2022 edition, is competing against Australia, the United States, South Korea and Japan for FIFA’s showpiece event in 12 years’ time.
The decision on the hosts of the 2018 and 2022 editions will be made in Zurich on December 2.
The World Cup in 2014 will be held in Brazil.
http://thepeninsulaqatar.com/qatar/129034-ours-one-stop-world-cup-venue-sheikh-mohammed.html
Follow us on our social media channels:
@ILQlive
@ILQlive
@ILoveQtr
ILoveQatar
