Here Comes My FIFA World Cup Breakdown


It’s A Cold Bitter Wind That Blatter The Hutt Brings – Engerland Own Worst Enemies Shocker

Fat Sepp douses the English with his icy distain. Sadly Scotland, Wales and the Irish are caught up as collateral damage

As any fule kno it seems that in addition to, or perhaps instead of, excellent facilities, commercial opportunities and hordes of supporters, what you really, really need is some kind of narrative with which to woo the jaded palates of the corrupt gerontocracy that is the FIFA Executive Committee, a group so venal and mentally ugly they make Emperor Palpetine look like the repository of all that is good in the universe. And it seems that while Engerland has one such narrative lying about (or maybe lie-ing about), it is sadly about being entombed into history rather than about making it and reinforces two very negative things about the English psychology.

First it is hideously insular, parochial and backward looking. We seem to believe not in the possibilities of the future, but in a golden past that is somehow always shockingly out of reach, a past filled with all the things everyone else hates, olde worlde tea, cakes, coppers, larks and those dribbley wingers like Stanley Matthews and defenders like Chopper Harris. A past it must be added which does not hold much, if any, joy for Jonny Foreigner, who is either enslaved, attacked or excluded or if possible all three at the same time.

Even our unofficial catchphrase, ‘Football’s Coming Home’, seems uniquely designed to both accentuate the historical negativity as well as subliminally damn all those pesky foreigners for daring to borrow it in the first place and thrice damn them for actually being somewhat better at it than we are. Anyway it’s patently clear that FIFA isn’t interested in football coming home, it’s the absolute last thing they want. They’re still in their empire building expansion phase, more Go West Young Man than come back home, or in this case Go East Young Man and then Go Middle East.

Second, possibly as a result of the first, we really don’t play well with others, being fundamentally incompetent at institutional politics of any sort, our sense of flat earth fairness and altruism (all Fotherington-Thomas and all if we’re continuing the Molesworth references) completely blinds us to the reality that everyone else is in it to get the best deal for themselves.

Where’s Your Vision Gone (Where’s Your Vision Gone) – Far, Far Away

We seem to be cursing FIFA not for having a vision of extending their greedy grip to new areas of exploitation, but for not making this transparently obvious in the first place. And subsequently for cynically milking their opportunity for all it’s worth. Which they have in the manner which banana republic dictators apply to foreign aid.

The truth is that FIFA’s choices show they actually have some kind of strategic vision, namely continuously expanding their grip on the game worldwide. Blatter the Hutt (who knows a thing or two about politicking) was elected on a remit of spreading the World Cup and effectively breaking the Europe/South America duopoly – a policy that got him elected thanks to three continentsworth of voters who didn’t live in the duopoly states.  And coincidentally it follows the gravity of wealth as the first world cedes sovereignty to the third world oil resources and population wealth. Which is the political story of the 21st Century just as the disintegration of the British Empire, the failure of Communism and the rise of America was the tale of the 20th.

All the chicanery aside, it could be that two winners will actually host fantastic World Cups. Certainly they’ve got more than enough time to develop the stadia and infrastructure necessary to do so. While OPEC (sorry Qatar) will be hosting the AFC Asian Cup Qatar 2011 in January, so they will actually have more recent experience of hosting international football events than the English.

Here’s how a cynic might read FIFA’s choices of World Cup venues since Italia 90, which was when football started to become a financial cesspit following its implosion in the 80s.

  • America (1994) – Refinancing and commercialising FIFA. The MasterCard Adidas World Cup (I’m beginning to see the money)
  • France (1998) – The masters of political chicanery get their party. Blatter The Hutt elected Head Boy.
  • Japan/South Korea (2002) – Payback pt 1. Hello Asia is that money in your pocket or are you just glad to see me?
  • Germany (2006) – Payback pt 2. Hello Bankers we have some money to launder (I’m beginning to bank my money)
  • South Africa (2010) – Payback pt 3. See I told you we’d have a World Cup in Africa. Sepp is reelected (tbc).
  • Brazil (2014) – Hello to the new world order of the BRICs nations
  • Russia (2018) – Hello oligarcacious corruption and patronage, goodbye to Western Europe (I’m beginning to bathe in money)
  • OPEC (2022) – Hello oil money, pleased to milk you, here are my deposit details. We have to transfer a World Cup to you, but in order to do this we need your account details and passwords. Please turn on the money sluice. And kindly look the other way I’m an old man struggling to withhold my dignity.

That Picture In Full

Jabber and his bitches. FIFA Executive Committee in session. Not entirely sure what the chap in black is doing. Maybe he is the one fule who voted for Engerland. The English member is the small, rodent-like thing on Jabber's shoulder.