Lausanne: FIFA is set to confirm on Wednesday that Saudi Arabia will host the 2034 World Cup while a joint bid by Morocco, Spain and Portugal, which also includes matches in South America, will be awarded the 2030 tournament.
The hosting rights for both tournaments will be announced for a vote during the FIFA Congress that will be held in practice, but there is no doubt about the outcome of the two being uncontested.
Until 2034, FIFA insisted on its principle of rotating its flagship tournament between continents, only welcoming bids from Asia or Oceania – the 2026 World Cup, the first of 48 teams, will be held across North America.
Controversially, the body gave potential bidders barely a month to submit candidates, and Australia and Indonesia quickly dropped their interest.
That left Saudi Arabia as the sole candidate, clearing the way for the World Cup to return to the Gulf region shortly after Qatar hosts in 2022.
Saudi Arabia already hosts a number of high-profile events including the Formula One Grand Prix, heavyweight boxing competitions, the LIV Rival Golf Circuit funded by the Saudi Sovereign Wealth Fund, and the WTA Finals tennis.
The awarding of the 2034 World Cup will be a significant moment, and Saudi will secure the hosting rights at a time when there are only two stadiums with a capacity of 40,000, when 14 are needed.
Beyond this logistical challenge, baking temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere summer could mean pushing the tournament back later in the year, as happened in Qatar in 2022.
However, the fact that Ramadan falls in December this year is an added complication.
Furthermore, awarding the World Cup to Saudi Arabia would once again make the issue of human rights an important issue, as it was two years ago.
Unprecedented speech.
The 2030 tournament will mark a century since the first World Cup was held in Uruguay, and the resulting bid will hand the South American nation a game with Argentina and Paraguay.
This makes it a completely unique dialect, comprising three different continental confederations.
FIFA confirmed a year ago that a joint proposal led by Morocco, Spain and Portugal was the only contender for 2030, with all other potential candidates down the road.
A joint British and Irish bid was abandoned when they decided to focus on hosting Euro 2028, while there were bid proposals from South Korea, China, Japan and North Korea.
The four South American nations launched a joint bid in 2019, convinced that the centenary World Cup should be held entirely on the continent where it all began.
In late 2022, UEFA promoted a bid to unite Spain and Portugal with war-torn Ukraine in a show of “solidarity” following the Russian invasion.
However, Ukraine quietly withdrew from the bid last year as Morocco joined forces with its Iberian neighbours, while South America was awarded the three-game host each to Uruguay, Paraguay and Argentina. had agreed to step aside.
Morocco is planning a mega stadium.
After these “celebrations of the century” in the relative cold of a Southern Hemisphere winter, the six teams involved — along with their fans — will have to cross the Atlantic to play the rest of the tournament.
The tentacle tournament will conclude with the final on July 21, and it remains to be seen where the game will be played.
Spain, which hosted the 1982 World Cup, is poised to take center stage as it has 11 of the 20 proposed stadiums.
Morocco – which has tried and failed on five previous occasions to be awarded a staging of the tournament – will become the second African country to host the competition after South Africa in 2010.
Possible venues for the final include Madrid’s Santiago Bernabeu and Barcelona’s Camp Nou, which is nearing the end of a significant renovation project, as well as the planned Hassan II stadium between Casablanca and Rabat, which will be “the most Ready to be the biggest stadium in the world” with a capacity of 115,000.
Portugal, which hosted Euro 2004, will offer two stadiums in Lisbon and one in Porto, and hopes to play in the semi-finals.