Not long until the World Cup

 Not long until the World Cup

The world of football is approaching this World Cup with a good deal of well-founded fear and trepidation. Quite apart from the minor concerns surrounding its location, its choice of country and its wildly unseasonal timing, there are so many outside considerations that have to be taken into account. It could prove to be one of the most successful World Cups in recent history but the pall of controversy that has now fallen quite disturbingly over a World Cup in Qatar just doesn't sit right for some of us.

The traditionalists would have you believe that one of the most prestigious and glamorous of international tournaments should have been resolved at the beginning of July rather than a week before Christmas. This just feels barely credible since most of us have come to regard the World Cup as a hugely enjoyable extension to the regular domestic club season all over the world. But here we are on the final day of October, the clocks have just gone back an hour in Britain and the rest of the football world is still wrestling with its conscience. 

But it's not as if we hadn't prepared for the forthcoming football banquets in the Middle East. UEFA, in its infinite ignorance according to some, have experimented too far. We have now seen a whole host of exotic locations for football's global top table and perhaps we should be conditioned to the eccentricities of those who make these strangely surreal decisions on football's future. In theory, there is nothing inherently wrong with Qatar as the host of this winter's World Cup but then you hear the complaints, the madness of it all, the deeply questionable morality issues that have underpinned all the preparations for this World Cup.

In 2002 South Korea and Japan brought an endearing charm to the World Cup with their quaint Oriental traditions and customs, the pagodas and temples and, of course, their football. South Korea progressed sensationally in that year's tournament and almost reached the Final. Eight years later in South Africa, the horrific evil of apartheid and racial hatred paled into insignificance as South Africa, patriotically backed by the effervescent Nelson Mandela, made us all feel very good about each other. The nation of the beautiful veldts and the Springboks made the memorable noise of the vuvuzelas and the country revelled in the reflected glory.

Four years ago Kylian M'Bappe became the most dangerous, gifted and natural goal scorer France had produced since the likes of Thierry Henry, Just Fontaine and Raymond Kopa. France will be in Qatar as World Cup holders and hoping that their footballing heritage will stand them in good stead for this edition of the World Cup. The French have always given us gastronomic feasts of attacking football. You'd hardly expect anything else. But whether the seasoning and garnish will be present to complete their sumptuous approach work remains to be seen.

And of course England will be in Qatar because England always qualify for both Euros and World Cup tournaments. For a number of years now England seem to be thrown into qualifying groups that would make a majority of park footballers salivate with joy and lick their lips. But we then all laugh at the predictability of it all, England sailing serenely into a major tournament and then lulled into a false sense of security. In Qatar, England will be in familiar territory but in circumstances that may be alien. They may have been in French vineyards and Italian piazzas and among Spanish siestas but the deserts of Qatar could find them flummoxed, perhaps out of their comfort zone and longing for British tomato ketchup.

But England will always have their Gareth Southgate, a man so polished and progressive in his thinking that you'd think butter wouldn't melt in his mouth. There is something of the erudite student about Southgate that always reminds you of a university don swotting up for a history exam. The beard is still an integral part of his persona and the air of the barrack room lawyer is still as palpable as ever. Southgate is no court room inquisitor although there is nothing judgmental about him. He does though conduct himself at Press conferences with all the diplomatic restraint of a man who just wants the best for his national team.

On November 21st England open their group qualifying World Cup match with the kind of game against the USA that still sends awkward shivers down England fans spines. In the 2010 World Cup group game in South Africa, England manager Fabio Capello looked like a man who had just discovered that somebody had stolen his bottle of Chianti. When England striker Wayne Rooney started mouthing unpleasant sounding accusations against his England supporters you almost sympathised with him. A side held to a goal-less draw by Algeria still sounds like a minor grim apocalypse. Disaster struck.

It hardly seems like it of course but older England supporters may still be haunted by Billy Wright's England 72 years ago. Back then of course English football thought it was somehow brazenly superior to every footballing nation across the globe. There was a snobbish insularity about England's football, a stubborn refusal to recognise the rest of the world. But in 1950 the USA, who were barely on nodding terms with a football let alone play the game, pulled off the most astonishing win in World Cup history. Even now the sight of billions of Americans tuning into their radios for what seemed the impossible dream can only be imagined and much to their stunned amazement that the USA had beaten England 1-0 in Belo Horizonte, Brazil.

England then play Iran, who are at the moment a country once again in military turmoil, a country tormented by the memory of tin pot dictators and nothing even remotely redemptive. The Ayatollah still casts a pernicious shadow over Iran and war is something the people have become tragically accustomed to. Still, football does have an innate capacity for bringing nations together, for harmonising the dissenting voices, pacifying the violent thugs and the murderous minds. England should beat Iran quite comfortably but then we are talking about England here.

And finally England play their last group game against Wales. It's hard to believe that the last time Wales reached a World Cup, Bill Hayley and the Comets were still rocking around the clock. Then gentleman John Charles towered over the World Cup of 1958 in Sweden and the valleys were melodious again. Wales almost stopped everybody in our tracks when a stunning Gareth Bale free kick gave them the lead in Euro 2016 against England. England ran out as winners though the hearts were beating like trip hammers.

We've all heard about Qatar's disgraceful human rights record, its aversion to alcohol, its criminal stance on homophobia and its general sense of what can only be described as perhaps naivete. This is their first time as hosts of a World Cup and it's hard to know what to make of a country that still thinks of football as some kind of expedient political tool to make its voice heard around the world. The smell of corruption seems almost repulsive at times and the chances are that judgments of their World Cup suitability may have to go on hold. But we'll all be there on all social media platforms, heated phone ins, TV, radio, Smartphone and any device that just happens to be at our disposal. 

World Cups don't get any more contentious or polarising as this one in Qatar. Your thoughts turn back to Manchester City's owners and those who control the purse strings at Newcastle United. Arab sheikhs and the vulgar rich of both clubs are almost a dominant sight in the Premier League. We await the arrival of now the vastly populated men's World Cup in Qatar. If you're ready, then we shall begin.