Gradults 0-2018 FIFA

How much do I hate gradults? This Much.

It’s hard to get excited about something that isn’t going to take place for another eight years but I like most people found myself getting wrapped up in the hype surrounding the World Cup host announcement today. I’ve seen the billboards and the stuff in the city centres urging me to ‘Back the Bid’ and I’ve scoffed: ‘2018?! It’ll never be 2018!’ I’m finding it hard to get excited about Glastonbury, I can’t envisage a time when there isn’t snow on the ground, let alone it being summer. So to get excited for something in 2018 would be madness. But then the hype really starts and suddenly everyone’s got an opinion. My golden rule is generally that if the BBC does a live feed about it then I’m interested in it; well the live feed started at 07.45 and I followed it avidly at work.

I was following when Sepp Blatter Davina’d the hell out a golden envelope and announced Russia would be hosting the 2018 World Cup. He paused for so long that I kept refreshing the page; I was convinced it had frozen. Like everyone, I had presumed that England had a great chance of winning; we had ‘The Three Lions’ over there, Beckham was looking resplendent in his suit, Cameron, unlike Putin had turned up and everyone loves a royal, no? We even had Andy Cole knocking about. But alas it wasn’t meant to be; in fact we only got 2 votes. And one of those was from our representative I’d hope. Does an open letter from The Sun not mean anything anymore?

Our main selling point was that we already had the infrastructure in place and ‘nobody loves football as much us’. But is that enough? Hosting the World Cup will be a chance for Russia to improve their infrastructure. Infact it would almost be a cop out for Fifa to give it to an established nation when it could do so much good in terms of development for a country like Russia, plus they’ve never hosted it before, it seems only fair that they get a go before we get our third chance to play host to a major tournament. Through gritted teeth I could say fair play for that decision but Qatar?! Now that’s silly season. Here’s a short list of reasons why I think Qatar should not be hosting a World Cup.

1. I don’t know where it is and I have a geography degree.

2. Do they play football? I mean, I’ve never seen them play football.

3. It will be 50 degrees when the matches are played. What will happen if Scotland qualify? (moot point I know)

4. Its against the law to be drunk in public in Qatar. Just a hunch but this could cause a few problems with our fans out there.

5. A Q should be followed by a U. I don’t trust a country that doesn’t respect the alphabet.

Today’s events are especially disappointing for gradults. I’m not going to say ‘imagine the amount of jobs it would have created’, it inevitably would have created a lot but they would have been for the next generation of gradults to fight over, I’d like to think we'll have sorted ourselves out by then. No, its particularly disappointing because it would of taken place just as we were entering our thirties, a time when you should have a bit of money and time to enjoy the spectacle and take in a couple of games. Now we won’t have the chance till at least 2030, by which time I will be 42, now that is too far away to get excited about.