All things World Cup

Talk around Fallston High School about the World Cup will always be welcomed, but if you want to pronounce Qatar right, pretend the first “a” isn’t there, say “cut,” and add a pirates “arrrr”. (I would recommend watching this quick video skipping to time 35 seconds to hear the correct pronunciation. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fPQjjWqdTTc ) 

Qatar’s construction because of the World Cup 

Qatar is an Asian country divided into eight municipalities with a population of around 2.9 million. With its capital in Doha, the country has eight stadiums for the games. The stadiums are the Lusail Iconic Stadium in Lusail, Al Bayt Stadium in Al Khor, Al Janoub Stadium in Al Wakrah, Ahmad Bin Ali Stadium, Khalifa International Stadium, Education City Stadium in Al Rayyan, Stadium 974, and Al Thumama Stadium in Doha.  

Being an oil rich country, Qatar earns $95.35 million every year and ranked in the top ten richest countries in the world in 2015 and 2016. Qatar also has the third largest natural gas reserve which comes with some perks, including spending $220 billion dollars on the construction of the World Cup. This includes the opening ceremony, stadiums, hotels, fan zones, blasting the air conditioning, expanding the main airport, making a new metro system with 1,100 electric buses, and constructing a city north of Doha, which adds up fast.  

Having three fan zones – a place where fans can enjoy the air conditioning, food, alcohol and comfort – spanning across Qatar, reaching a collective capacity of 40,000, fans were shocked when they were turned away on the first day of the World Cup because there was no room. Usually just being there would be enough, but with the spiking temperatures ranging from 79 to 89 degrees, fans didn’t enjoy the lack of planning, especially when Qatar sold over 800,000 tickets for the opening games. 

Sad to say it, but that is not the only problem with Qatar, being oil rich does help but also shows a side that may be better left unsaid.  

Qatar’s problems 

Qatar being one of the eleven countries to give a death penalty for LGBTIQQ relations has made many hesitant about visiting. Qatar made a statement saying, “all are welcome,” but to respect the nation’s culture. 

An international ban on alcohol was lifted just for the World Cup and it was known by fans for months to allow beer in the stadiums. The day before the World Cup started, Qatar made an executive decision to only allow alcohol in the fan zones and of course in hotel bars which is in the original agreement. Budweiser shipped hundreds of cases that will go unsold during the world cup resulting in Budweiser tweeting, “well this is awkward.” Budweiser ended up saying the winning team will be rewarded with all the remaining alcohol, giving them the problem of shipping it all back.  

Almost everyone has heard the rumors of the brutality and exploitation of the workers rushing to build the stadiums and many have protested the games. Having around 6,500 migrant workers reportedly die since Qatar was announced ten years ago as being the host for the World Cup, the world was shocked by the horror stories and the lack of care from the government that was shown. Since 94% of Qatar’s population is migrant workers, the exploitation of the Qatar government is horrific.  

The cherry on top would have to be bribing Ecuador with seven million dollars to lose the game with a score of 0-1, letting Qatar score in the second half. Of course, Ecuador took a hard pass and dominated completely. This game set two records: one record was for the least number of shots ever in a World Cup game, eleven, and the second was the first time a host team lost in the opening game. 

My predictions and important games 

Portugal v. Ghana – The first game to start the World Cup off strong ended with an easy win for Portugal. Portugal (ranked ninth) was projected to win against Ghana (ranked sixty first, the lowest ranked), and did by a 3-2 score, but they took a while to warm up. This was a momentous game for multiple reasons: Cristiano Ronaldo scored the first goal of this match with a PK, making him the first man to score in five World Cups. (Marta Viera da Silva, a Brazilian woman, was the first individual to score in five separate World Cups in 2019, but we’ll also reward Renaldo for it as well). There are rumors he will get picked up by the English Premier League, who play Manchester United – the team that let him go recently – making it a very exciting match if the rumors are true. 

My prediction is, as many will agree, that Brazil and France will face off. Brazil being ranked first in the world makes them a solid opponent with 1841.3 points. With the last seven matches looking like: 4-0, 4-0, 4-0, 5-1, 1-0, 3-0, and 5-1. With a total of 26 goals, how could you not root for them? Not to mention Brazil is the only country to make every single World Cup, dating back to 1930. Playing their first game against Serbia, we finally saw Neymar, number ten, grow up. He has a history of diving for balls excessively. Even the announcers have said that his “maturity has been questioned” which just hearing it being said over live television made me laugh.  

France is ranked fourth with 1759.78 points. We do know Belgium and Argentina are ranked higher than France, but with France winning the last World Cup, I have faith that they will come out on top.  

The teams I rooted for were the Mexican national team and the American national team and since both are now out of the running, I fully believe I am bad luck. After the second game for Mexico, I fully understood the lack of talent that was being shown and that there is no effort and will continue to not put in any effort. The second I found this out I chucked my jersey across the room. For the American team, my sense of patriotism took over and riotously so because the game against Britain and America was amazing. Sadly, we lost the spark and are now returning home. 

My team, and will always be, is the Colombian national team. Colombia is ranked sixteenth on the FIFA men’s world rankings, making them a perfect opponent for the World Cup, but didn’t qualify. Italy also didn’t qualify even though they are ranked sixth. Having 32 teams in the World Cup, the fact that both Colombia and Italy didn’t qualify is tough. What makes it worse is that Qatar did, a team that is ranked fiftieth. Because they are the hosts, Qatar does have the perks of automatically qualifying, but they also have the shame of losing every game they play.