Controversial but it’s still football

Twelve years after former Fifa president Sepp Blatter announced Qatar as a host, the World Cup is finally underway.

An event that normally fills fans with impatient trepidation, this year’s World Cup has been under a cloud for a very long time for several different reasons.

Blatant violations of human rights, poor and dangerous working conditions spread around the Gulf country’s construction sites, and bribery accusations against members of the football governing body’s executive committee are drawing people away from the World Cup.

Cyprus is no exception. As in many countries around Europe, in stadiums around the island for the past weeks, fans of different teams have voiced their disappointment towards the upcoming event.

During the league game against rivals Anorthosis, Omonia Nicosia fans unrolled a banner calling for a boycott of the World Cup. Anti-Qatar chants were also heard in Limassol and Paphos.

“We cannot stand by idly and pretend that this will be a normal World Cup,” Giorgos, 27, an Omonia Nicosia fan, told the Cyprus Mail.

“I will not be watching a single game from Qatar and I know for a fact that many other fans in Cyprus will do the same.”

Other fans, despite the skepticism and the disappointment, said it is too late to boycott the event, claiming that a similar response would be a case of ‘too little, too late.’

“Boycotting it now makes no sense whatsoever. Something should have been done immediately after it was assigned back in 2010, now it would be just opportunistic, it’s a trend,” said Andreas, a student at the University of Cyprus in Nicosia.

“I have watched every World Cup since I started following football and I will watch this one as well. Do I agree with what Qatar is doing? Absolutely not, but the blame is on Fifa and on the event’s sponsors, it cannot be the fans’ responsibility to send a message.