FIFA Executive Committee members were impressed by the warmth of the lobbying efforts of World Cup winners Russia and Qatar

Players of the Year . . .

WORLD CUP AWARDED
TO TWO HELLHOLES 

By Geoffrey Dawson
Foreign Editor 

ZURICH, Switzerland – Soccer fans around the world are still grappling with the shocking news that the next two FIFA World Cups will be played in unsuitable hellholes whose climate and infrastructure should have disqualified them from holding an outdoor flea market and bake sale, much less scores of critical soccer matches which will attract the attention of the entire world.  

FIFA turned down well-financed and -organized bids from the United States and the United Kingdom, both of whom have successfully held international sporting competitions of similar size and scope in the past. Instead, it awarded the 2018 World Cup to Russia and the 2022 to Qatar, a tiny desert Emirate which swelters in the humidity of the Persian Gulf each June, when the World Cup is scheduled.

Although the Russian climate in June is not thought to preclude all athletic activity, unlike Qatar's, some of the venues proposed by shirtless Slavic strongman Vladimir Putin include distant Siberian settlements which in June are plagued by snow, if the athletes are lucky, and mosquitoes, if they are not.

Even more bizarrely, neither winner has anything like the infrastructure available to hold tens of thousands of soccer players and assorted hangers-on. The Russians stadiums are crumbling Stalinist-era relics and the Qatari ones do not in fact exist.

Complicating the development of the Qatari venues is the need to contend with June daytime temperatures in the Emirate in excess of 120º Fahrenheit with dewpoints in the unendurable 80's, a combination that would spell death by heatstroke for anyone foolish enough to kick a soccer ball around in the midday sun.

The plucky Qataris have assured FIFA that mass slaughter can be avoided by air-conditioning the outdoor stadiums somehow or another, an extravagant waste of energy that will save players' lives but advance the melting of the polar icecaps by several decades.

FIFA Executive Committee members agreed that Qatari Hostess Committee Chair Bree Kantrowitz was both "tireless" and "flexible"

The obvious absurdity of the Russian and Qatari bids left soccer enthusiasts speechless with bemusement and searching for some explanation for a selection process that could best be described as opaque.

However, in an exclusive interview with this world-famous foreign correspondent, FIFA President Sepp T. Semiah, the long-time FIFA supremo and former Bucharest nightclub owner explained how the Russian and Qatari bids won the support of FIFA's Executive Committee.

Accompanied by his youthful publicist and masseuse Lexi Nussbaum, Semiah said that Russia and Qatar best exemplified FIFA's values. "Russia and Qatar are both corrupt dictatorships ruled absolutely by a tiny superrich unaccountable elite, so of course we saw eye to eye with them."

"Our Executive Committee was impressed by the warm personal reception our members received during Presentation Week last summer in St. Tropez. Qatar's gift to each member of a Mercedes S500 certainly made an impression on FIFA," he said.

Several Executive Committee members told the Spy in confidence that they were also persuaded by the young female "representatives" retained by the two winning countries to lobby them on yachts owned by the Emir of Qatar.

Those members added that when the Russian hostesses left their suites [Surely, meetings? – Ed.], they left behind kilogram bars of Russian gold emblazoned with the words "Russia 2018. There's plenty more where this came from."

Those Committee members grumbled that the only swag they got from the United States and United Kingdom delegations were a few free dinners in Zurich. According to some sources, even those modest outreach efforts backfired badly on the United States.

The U.S. gala dinner featured an array of celebrities including U.S. Olympic Gold Medal Winner Mia Hamm, who energetically worked the room, offering to pose for a picture with each Committee member. However, when one Committee member, apparently misunderstanding the details of Ms. Hamm's offer, suggested that she pose with him naked on a trapeze, his proposition was rewarded by a punch in the mouth from Hamm's husband, former Sox great Nomar Garciaparra, which took six stitches to close and spelled the end of whatever chance the U.S. had to host a World Cup anytime in this century.

Notwithstanding the unfortunate incident involving Mr. and Mrs. Garciaparra, FIFA President Semiah told the Spy that the U.S. and UK bids were doomed by their refusal to grant full immunity to FIFA officials for whatever offenses they might commit during the tournament. Asked if FIFA was demanding that its hacks be allowed to rape, pillage, and even murder with impunity as the price for awarding the World Cup to a country, Semiah said that FIFA had been willing to negotiate on murder.  

Don't believe us?  Click here or here. – Ed.