acrossthepond

I just got done saying that Qatar had nothing 12 years ago and was a desert 24 years ago. They're building cities? Of course they're building cities, they have a country that's essentially a blank slate and unlimited money. They have something imaginatively named Education City now, which is just a built-from-the-ground-up nexus for all the divisions of various universities around the world that build their outposts in Qatar. This is a place where a lot can change in a very short time. Their laws are modernising, their country is growing, their infrastructure is improving. They fancy themselves as the "other Dubai" - in other words, a rich people's playground. Not where I would've chosen to have the first Middle Eastern world cup, but there's many worse choices. The only people who can have a justifiable complaint about this, imo, are the Aussies. People trying to suggest the USA has better football culture than the Middle East are having a laugh (and they had it in '94 anyway and it didn't change shit in this country), South Korea and Japan were never going to work for obvious reasons. Australia probably would've been a good pick but the time zone issue will have cost them. Nevertheless I expect they'll get it at some point in the future and I wish them well, it'll do the world some good for Australia to have the world cup, just the same as it'll do the world some good for Qatar to have it.

Some of the knee-jerking going on in this thread is OTT. Russia was a stitch-up and to me the far more egregious problem. Qatar is an attempt to choose a new frontier for the game, to give something positive to a region where there are relatively few positives, and to show that FIFA are capable of progress. I don't doubt that money played a massive part, but ffs, it's 2010 and some on here are writing off a World Cup that won't happen for 12 years. I think the Qatari WC will be a true spectacle. The country's administration clearly has ambition and they will spare no expense to make this a success. So much can change in 12 years in a country like Qatar. 12 years ago, it was a shadow of itself; 12 years before that it was a desert. Why don't we wait and see?

If you were serious, it moves back 2 weeks every year and it ran from 2nd week of August-2nd week of September this year. So in 12 years it'll have moved back 6 months and it'll be in February/March. Nee bother.

Qatar is a good place to host it, only thing is that their team is even more shit than South Africa. Their slogan is "expect amazing" but I'd expect embarrassment.

All too obvious that one. Good on them though.

Russia is a continent now too, Blatter now changing not only history but geography. Fuck off will you?

Russia ffs.

My game is brown envelopes?

Christ, someone fucking shoot that saggy Swiss scumbag.

Cameron's involvement wrecked it imo, the voters were put off by his punchable face.

I just read Qatar was the favourite somewhere yesterday. Has the situation changed that quickly?

Spain/Portugal and Qatar for me. Not that I wouldn't love for England to get it, and I think we'd be a good host nation, but I think too many feathers have been ruffled among the FIFA bigwigs. Qatar an absolute shoo-in imo.

Was thinking about this the other day watching Everton. Very, very glad we missed out on Beckford, he looks a total flop and the very definition of a one-trick pony. Same with Woodgate under KK - thought it was a sure thing but he went to Spurs and I think we dodged another bullet with that transfer. Rolling back the years a bit (sad to think of SBR's time that way) I think Jeffers is the obvious choice. Others I've missed?

It'll take another year for them to come up.

Featherweight class champion.

I don't know wtf Carroll was playing at there at the end, time and time again we needed him in the box and he was back with Tiote. Not impressed. That's the kind of "Superman" play we can do without. Ranger looked good, Jonas desperately needed to pass more to him at the end, Enrique excellent throughout and MOTM. With Barton to deliver the set pieces we might've taken all 3 here, but that was a good performance and well worthy of a point even if we rode our luck a bit.

1-1 I reckon... GET IN! Nice one Alex

What a surprise, the Saudis are involved.

You been drinking, or have you stepped through a time warp back to 2008? Ashley wonderland, top four. Give your head a shake ffs. This post sounds like you're on drugs.

If this is how we play when missing only two first-teamers I shudder to think how we're going to be next sunday without Barton, Colo or Williamson. Can't think why Hughton would rather play Guthrie wide right than Routledge. Must not rate him at all, but he looked decent when he came on. Routledge on the wing and Guthrie instead of Smith would've been much better. Our players generally wanted far too much time on the ball and were simply being outran, outmuscled and outplayed. Atrocious.

Another two easy chances muffed. Starting to wonder just what Lovenkrands is doing in black and white. EDIT: There's another one from Williamson. It's not as though we haven't had opportunities in this game.

If the defence hadn't been playing around and trying to pass it out there, it would never have come to that. Coloccini had an opportunity to clear but didn't.

This is not unique to Ashley though... expand ? Ashley is hardly the only owner who's fucked around with his manager and sold players/brought in players the manager wanted/didn't want. Lerner at Villa and the Icelanders at West Ham are two good examples. I think we could still be rid of Ashley and in the same situation with someone else. Obviously I want Ashley gone as soon as possible, but not if it means bringing in someone just as bad or worse. Portsmouth were desperate to be rid of the crook Gaydamak, then they brought in another crook in al-Fahim, then they brought in another crook in Al Faraj...point is, there's worse than Ashley, and as long as he keeps his head down and his mouth shut and supports Hughton in the transfer window, it's time to get over him. Nobody wants him except for loons like the Tree, but we can't go on with him being the focus of our lives as fans. Ashley gets a lot of stick, some of it deserved, but would you care to expand on how HE has fucked around managers and bought / sold players the manager didnt want. My reccolection is that he was the detatched owner and until it all went Pete tong I dont really remember him be involved in any of the day to day sort of decisions. I dont recall Allardyce or Keegan blaming him personally for that sort of thing. Not even sure since Keegan what actual decisions he's made that have been against the wishes of manager or players. Seriouis question btw if your up to it. Keegan said nowt because of the non-disclosure agreement. I think the tribunal made it pretty obvious who was responsible for that. How about forcing Given out of the club? How about bringing in Xisco and Nacho and selling Milner? The '08-'09 season was pretty awful, but surely you haven't forgotten it? There's obvious examples of Ashley responsible for fucking about our manager (one he himself appointed) and bringing in players not wanted/selling players that were wanted. I know what your stock response is going to be - "oh Llambias did those things not wor Mike, he's lily-white" - but the buck stops with the owner. He appointed the cronies, he's responsible for what they do, and as the tribunal said, he made promises to KK that weren't kept and that he never had any intention of keeping.

This is not unique to Ashley though... expand ? Ashley is hardly the only owner who's fucked around with his manager and sold players/brought in players the manager wanted/didn't want. Lerner at Villa and the Icelanders at West Ham are two good examples. I think we could still be rid of Ashley and in the same situation with someone else. Obviously I want Ashley gone as soon as possible, but not if it means bringing in someone just as bad or worse. Portsmouth were desperate to be rid of the crook Gaydamak, then they brought in another crook in al-Fahim, then they brought in another crook in Al Faraj...point is, there's worse than Ashley, and as long as he keeps his head down and his mouth shut and supports Hughton in the transfer window, it's time to get over him. Nobody wants him except for loons like the Tree, but we can't go on with him being the focus of our lives as fans.