Read Andy’s column every week in the Western Morning News The beautiful game is not so pretty now
BEER and armbands were the big talking points as the 2022 World Cup started this week, both of which represented huge U-turns by FIFA, presumably at the insistence of the Qatari hosts.
So much for the World Cup being a tournament which celebrated the beautiful game and reflecting the fact that football is for everyone.
On the morning of England’s first match, FIFA said captains from a number of European nations who had planned to wear rainbow armbands in support of LGBTQ+ rights would be punished or even removed from the pitch for doing so, rowing back on another pledge at the last minute.
It was only last Friday that it was announced that the sale of beer at the stadia hosting World Cup games would be banned, with Budweiser putting out a tweet saying ‘well, this is awkward’ (later deleted), having paid more than £60 million for the right to be the event’s beer providers.
Some might agree that allowing fans to drink beer at a sporting event in public in a country which is Muslim and therefore has strict laws on alcohol is just respecting local laws, and as such is fair enough.
That argument is reasonable, as if you can’t get through a sporting event without a beer then the issue might not be with organisers selling it to you.
However, there is a problem with the late notice of the change, as Qatar ‘won’ the right to host the
World Cup based on the idea that all the usual freedoms would carry on – whether that was having a beer before the game or showing your support for the LGBTQ+ community.
What if Qatar insisted that women would have to be completely covered if they were to be in public? Even those from other nations?
I might be being fatuous, but it has been such a controversial start to the tournament that you would not put it past FIFA to insist on it.
On the subject of alcohol, it should be remembered that even in football stadia in this country you can’t drink a beer while in the stands. All alcoholic drinks have to be consumed before you take your seat.
It is different in rugby. You can take beers to your seat and happily quaff them as the action unfolds. Unfortunately, that can mean that the floor under your seat can end up sticky with spilled pints, so you have to be careful you keep everything in your pocket or on your lap if you don’t want it to get a soaking.
There was a debate on the matter a while back, with a man from Wales saying he was sick of having to get up out of his seat every time one of the fans in his row needed to empty their bladder or refill their plastic cups.
Beer should be restricted to the bars in the inner parts of the ground, he said, and not brought up to the areas where people were trying to watch the game. Like in football.
I was lucky enough to be at the home of rugby at the weekend, and had a ticket to watch England in their Autumn Nations series at Twickenham.
Sure enough, by half-time the floor under my seat was wet with beer that had been spilled higher up the stand and had trickled down.
People in front left their seats halfway through the first half to get four more pints of beer from the bar, returning with the plastic cups held in those cardboard carriers that enable you to carry them all at the same time.
By the time I walked out, my shoes looked more like I had walked through a series of puddles than sat and watched a rugby match.
So I get the idea that maybe while the game is going on you should be more focused on the sport than on the drinking. But I’m sure this won’t be the last of the controversies we hear of at this sham of a World Cup!
‘So much for the World Cup being a tournament which celebrated the beautiful game’