Qatar 2022 to serve up 12 hours unbroken TV coverage per day
Armchair fans will be able to binge watch four World Cup matches every day during the group stage of Qatar 2022.
The match schedule also kept open the possibility of supporters attending more than one game per day at an event in which all venues lie within a 40-mile radius.
Group-stage matches kick off at 10am, 1pm, 4pm and 7pm UK time for the first eight days of the World Cup, which is likely to result in at least 12 hours of unbroken daily television coverage.
Kick-off times for the final rounds of group games and knockout matches will be 3pm and 7pm.
Fixtures will not be assigned to venues until after the finals draw in March 2022 in order to choose optimal kick-off times to suit television audiences in different countries.
The entire group stage has been condensed into 12 days due to the tournament being four days shorter than the last two World Cups.
The opening match will be played at the Al Bayt stadium in Al Khor on Monday, Nov 21, and will feature the host country. The final will be played on Sunday, Dec 18, at the Lusail Stadium north of Doha.
Gareth Southgate, the England manager, began preparations for the tournament when he visited Qatar for the Club World Cup last December.
Meanwhile, a report to the UN Security Council has highlighted the continued existence of “structural racial discrimination against non-nationals” in Qatar’s construction sector.
Around two million migrant workers are involved in helping to build World Cup venues and other tournament-related infrastructure.
The local organisers employ around four per cent of construction workers in the country and were commended by the report’s author on the measures and safeguards they had implemented in relation to timely and reliable payments and living conditions. However, workers’ representatives still called for there to be non-discriminatory minimum wage protections and more liberal immigration rules.
The remaining 96 per cent of the construction industry was deemed to have failed to reach the required standard. The UN’S special rapporteur for racism, Tendayi Achiume, said a “de facto caste system” existed “according to which European, North American, Australian and Arab nationalities enjoy greater human rights protections than South Asian and sub-saharan African nationalities”.