Thanks to the long overdue publication of the Garcia report into the bidding process for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups, we now know that England’s efforts to secure the 2018 tournament amounted to “a form of bribery”. Obviously, the only thing less surprising than the fact that England break the rules is how bad they are at it. If an England bid team ever gets within 30 sniffs of actually winning a World Cup bid again, no effort should be spared in investigating how they do business. They are, in the words of pursed-lips grandmas, no better than they should be.
For now, however, England remain as likely to win a World Cup bid as they do to win a World Cup, and we must turn our thoughts to more pressing questions raised by the report by Fifa’s then chief ethics investigator. Namely – and I don’t mean any disrespect to the emir and his accidental vagina stadium – is the Qatar World Cup a thought experiment?
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