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I must have been 10 when I went to a football match with my parents and realised that the game resonated far beyond the field of play. The game was at the Cooperage Stadium in Mumbai and we had gone to see East Bengal, a legendary Indian team, play in a cup competition. The team had been formed during the days of the Raj to represent the Hindus of East Bengal. This was where my father had grown up, amid much luxury, our family being part of the rich Hindu minority that dominated East Bengal, where most of the population was Muslim.
All of this was lost in 1947 as a result of the partition of India, when East Bengal became East Pakistan, now Bangladesh, and millions of Hindus left. My father, who had made Mumbai his home, knew he could never go back. Watching the East Bengal team that Sunday afternoon was his way of connecting with the land he always regarded as home and whose loss he mourned. As East Bengal won, my father’s spirits lifted.
Like my father, millions will be supporting their teams during the Qatar World Cup for reasons that go far beyond 22 men kicking a ball for 90 minutes. They will do so, despite the World Cup being held in a country with a dreadful human rights record and whose treatment of migrant workers is appalling. I am under no illusions, having visited Qatar, met the migrants who built the stadiums and seen their dreadful living conditions. But, despite that, I will be in front of my television on Sunday afternoon when Qatar kicks off the competition.
At every professional level, the game is no longer the pleasant weekend activity of my youth. It is now a sordid marriage between money and football’s power barons, with the fans used as pawns to preserve the myth of the beautiful game.
Nobody works at preserving that myth better than Fifa, the world body that controls the game. If proof were needed, it was provided on Tuesday. As the England team flew into Qatar in a jet that advertised its support for LGBT rights, Gianni Infantino, the president of Fifa, was in Bali lecturing world leaders at the G20 summit that the World Cup could be used to stop the Russian devastation of Ukraine. Infantino is not the first Fifa president to make such ridiculous claims. His predecessor, the infamous Sepp Blatter, made the idea of Fifa going where the United Nations could not go almost an art form. It reflects the fact that these leaders see themselves not as running sports bodies but managing mini-states.
In England, we can hardly claim the moral high ground, having paid our obeisance to Fifa for years. During both the England bids for the 2006 and 2018 World Cups our political leaders courted Fifa, and Blatter was received at No 10 as if he were the head of a sovereign state. At a reception for him in Downing Street, David Cameron said, “One of the first things I did when I became prime minister was to call you to reconfirm the new government’s full support for England 2018”, adding unctuously, “Mr President, you have done a huge amount for football during your whole life. The decisions you have made have been instrumental in taking the game to new heights.” Such heights. On Blatter’s watch, during the four decades when he was first Fifa general secretary and then president, multiple World Cup votes became the subject of corruption allegations.
During the 2006 bid, the Treasury was persuaded to provide a financial guarantee to please Blatter. Manchester United wanted this before it would agree to miss the FA Cup and take part in the Fifa Club World Cup in Brazil. This was a pet Blatter project and, it was argued, necessary to help England secure crucial votes.
The difference with Qatar is that, while England failed dismally in its courtship of Fifa, eliminated on both bids with only two votes, Qatar succeeded. Qatar has always denied charges of corruption. However, 16 of the 22 who chose Qatar have found themselves accused, banned or indicted over allegations of corruption or wrongdoing. Blatter has also been banned by Fifa.
What is also telling is how late the whole question of human rights in Qatar has emerged. I was in Zurich on 2 December 2010 when Qatar was chosen. The human rights issue raised related to Russia, which had won the 2018 bid. Vladimir Putin, having jetted in to celebrate, batted away my question on the subject. And when I asked him who would pay for the World Cup, he pointed to Roman Abramovich, who was sitting in the front row, saying he was a rich man. Abramovich, then owner of Chelsea, smiled, having supported his country’s bid. It is such alliances between politics and business that underpin modern sport, and something we in this country happily accept.
Having covered several World Cups, I am well aware of the contrast between Fifa barons and football fans. It is common for these barons to fly in first class and stay in luxurious hotels, all expenses paid, for the meetings that precede the competition. But once these finish, most of these barons fly off before the tournament begins. For them football is business. In contrast, fans scrabble for match tickets because for them the game represents something that is increasingly rare in modern life.
Why? Because football can be a source of hope and belief and a space to express extreme feelings, a sense of right and wrong, even a glimpse of another kind of existence. Supporting a team or player gives you multiple ways to put some meaning into your life and to express your identity. Your favourite player can be an imaginary family member, companion or lover. Your chosen team can put you into a community that is as big or as small as you might wish. Season ticket holders at a football club, sitting next to the same person every other week and watching their favourite team for years, develop bonds that little else in our society can create. And with religion playing an increasingly insignificant role in our lives, this gives a very special meaning to those watching football and other sports.
A successful team can also have a dramatic impact, as I found during the summer. In August, immediately after England’s Lionesses won the Euros, my daughter sent me a WhatsApp message, “Hope you are watching. We won.” I was surprised as I had often taken her to watch live football but, frankly, she had never shown much interest in the game. Now, having watched the women’s victory with friends, she felt elated.
We cannot watch the World Cup in Qatar with that same innocence. We know how it got there. We know what it says about those involved and those exploited to bring it about. But we will watch, hoping that the humanity in the beautiful game outweighs the ugliness of the path it has taken. We love this game. We cannot do otherwise.
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