Australia on high alert in 2023 World Cup bid

AUSTRALIAN football bosses say they will “carefully” monitor the process for awarding the 2023 Women’s World Cup hosting rights, amid new fears it will be another one shrouded in secrecy and controversy.

The decision on who will host the tournament in four years’ time will not be made until next year, and will be the remit of FIFA’s ruling council, a 37-strong panel that usually meets in private.

After the hosting rights for the 2018 and 2022 tournaments were mired in allegations of bribery and corruption, the award of the men’s World Cup last year was made by all 203 FIFA members in a public vote, with a joint bid from the US, Mexico and Canada chosen over Morocco’s entry.

Football Federation Australia, currently one of only two confirmed bidders alongside Colombia, expects to learn the detail of the bidding process next month when countries that complete an expression of interest are talked through every step before the decision in March next year.

Though FFA has not yet been told whether the FIFA Council vote will be made public, its decisions are not normally subject to public scrutiny. Officials say they are cau- tiously optimistic that FIFA’s “substantial reform” will allow for a transparent bidding process, nine years after attempts to land the 2022 World Cup for Australia ended in the humiliation of a single vote.

Qatar was chosen despite a welter of allegations around its bid before and after, and the Garcia Report into the awarding of the 2018 and 2022 tournaments was critical of Australia’s bid.

FFA chief executive David Gallop said Australia had always been aware that FIFA had explicitly changed the rules over the awarding of only the men’s World Cup — leaving all others in the gift of the FIFA Council.

“The FIFA statutes were amended to reflect a vote of the Congress for the Men’s World Cup only, so this doesn’t come as a surprise,” Gallop said yesterday.