As the tournament director for Euro 2024, I am meeting a lot of people from German grassroots football.
Children with whom I take
selfies,
coaches who teach values to their young players, presidents of small clubs who have been doing their job voluntarily for decades... They all love the lightness of football, know its educational power and appreciate its importance. for our community.
However, when the conversation turns to Qatar, his tone turns serious.
Many consider missing a World Cup voluntarily for the first time in their lives.
In the past, this was a popular festival;
for the children, a kind of initiation to football that they will remember for the rest of their lives.
However, some fan clubs think about emptying the beer tables and leaving the screen in the storage room for a month.
All this makes it clear to me once again: giving the World Cup to Qatar was a mistake.
It does not belong to them.
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Qatar, the most expensive (and controversial) world cup in history
FIFA's election process was problematic.
It was unusual that for the first time two tournaments were awarded simultaneously.
Qatar and Russia won the bid, despite strong competition.
The match schedule in Qatar had to be postponed from summer to winter.
The desert heat had not been taken into account at first, although an internal FIFA report had warned of this and also pointed to other shortcomings of the bid.
Other decisive reasons for bringing the World Cup to Qatar occurred in December 2010. Of the 24 FIFA elected officials, almost all were later disqualified, punished or prosecuted by the Court;
even two had already been suspended for corruption before the election of the venue.
Hand in hand with Qatar, FIFA has damaged football and also its credibility as a Western organization and international institution.
Another lesson from Qatar: in the future, human rights must become an indispensable criterion at major sporting events.
Indeed, Qatar has made progress in response to fan criticism and media investigations, ratifying some international law agreements and introducing the minimum wage.
But homosexuals continue to be criminalized, women are considered inferior to men, and freedom of the press and expression are restricted.
Human rights experts from the Friedrich Naumann Foundation say that the conditions of migrant workers, thanks to whom the World Cup is possible, have been devastating.
Their deaths were accepted and not investigated, their families have received no compensation, and Qatar itself has admitted to the abuses.
According to
Forbes
, the World Cup will cost at least 150,000 million dollars, that is, about 10 times more than the World Cup in Russia, the most expensive to date.
In a country the size of Kosovo and with fewer people than Berlin, there are eight ultra-modern, air-conditioned stadiums.
There is no culture from which fans can benefit and barely a thousand spectators on average attend professional league matches.
Soccer is not an
amateur
sport in Qatar, and there are virtually no opportunities for women to compete.
A soccer tournament in such a place is not sustainable.
However, the approach of holding a World Cup in a new region is the correct one.
In 2010 it was held for the first time in Africa.
Before that, I had traveled to South Africa, still a player at the time, to learn about the host country and the circumstances in which it was going to be played.
A World Cup could also have contributed positively to the football culture in the Middle East, because there are also countries with football traditions there.
paid entertainers
Or perhaps the party could have been brought to the Arabic-speaking world: Morocco and Algeria.
Germany faced Morocco in the 1970 World Cup, we lost to Algeria in the 1982 World Cup, and before winning the title in 2014, we also had to go to extra time against Algeria in the round of 16.
That game in Porto Alegre seemed like an away game, because many Algerian fans had traveled there.
Qatar has never qualified for a World Cup, but its bid won on the first try.
Now, fans from all over the world will have to stop over in neighboring countries to travel to the matches.
In the stadiums there will be paid entertainers in order to create an atmosphere and promote the event on social networks.
An environment that does not interest me as a football fan.
I would only have flown to Qatar if my job as tournament director required it.
Since it is not the case, I stay at home.
In some countries teams have been asked to boycott the tournament.
That is something everyone must decide for themselves.
It seems right to me that Germany participates, and I would also be happy if we become world champions.
Qatar is an economic partner and energy supplier to the West, Germany maintains diplomatic relations with Qatar, and the decision dates back 12 years.
Each one must answer for himself if he watches the games on television.
I will do it, the German team is important.
Euro 2024 in Germany depends on their performance.
For the tournament to be successful, the team has to perform better in Qatar than in the previous two tournaments.
In principle, a World Cup is a great event.
Sportingly, a national team tournament is unpredictable and there are more teams with a chance of winning the title than in the Champions League.
Conditions in Qatar, in particular, could favor surprises.
The rhythm is different, the World Cup is held in the middle of the season and the teams have almost no preparation.
South America may reappear.
Maybe an African country will beat a big soccer nation, or a small European country will reach the final, as Croatia did in 2018. And Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo will retire from the world stage.
Or maybe a new star is born.
It does not have to be a contradiction to find the political background of the World Cup questionable and to continue celebrating the party that it represents for football.
It is not a betrayal of our values to meet friends for a beer and talk non-stop about football.
Another issue is whether this World Cup will be the biggest, because it is winter and human rights are not non-negotiable for the host country.
Yet we have a human need to come together.
A World Cup is also a community experience between like-minded people.
In the special circumstances in which Europe finds itself, it can serve to strengthen solidarity and resilience.
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