‘Never has football been hijacked so completely by a country for its own ends’

A winter World Cup, with a final days before Christmas, in and of itself bizarre but that’s what FIFA, football’s governing body, decided on ten years ago when they awarded the big bash to Qatar.

For this minute desert country, this spectacle is a gift-wrapped opportunity to make money and draw investors to their small patch, ahead perhaps of any other country in the middle East. It literally is a ‘showcase’ for Qatar.

A world ...