Doomed England set up by FIFA's setup

Wills, The PM and D-Beck shown to be out their depth.

England have left Zurich in last place with just two votes, as Russia claim the prize of hosting the World Cup in 2018.

Independent observers may congratulate FIFA on awarding a football nation in need. Crumbling stadia and problems with racism in the fanbase can now be addressed.

Where we failed in naivety, we certainly made up in presentation. But good PR wasn't the currency FIFA dealt in.

Wheeling out the "Big Guns", Prince William, David Cameron and David Beckham for the final push ahead of the vote sure looked great.

But as the dust settles on Russia's win and Qatar's for 2022, the white-teethed, blond good guys have been rather made to look like The Three Stooges.

England's bid team, made up of marketing executives and legal experts were from the professional class - and so totally lacked the experience and realpolitik associated with FIFA, the brotherhood of the unaccountable and corrupt, led by Sepp Blatter.

David Dein, who knows his way around football's political corridors and could've wrestled with the best of them, was brought in too late.

Now our bid team are looking for jobs, rather than knighthoods.

The BBC are said to be partly to blame for the Panorama show which outed corruption among FIFA members - but the problem was far deeper than that.



We were totally outclassed by the savvy Russians, who did what they had to do.



Sepp Bellend Blatter

As I sat with friends watching pictures from Switzerland, Ambrose Mendy suggested our bid should've been British. Bringing in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland would have softened the edges of the England bid, because frankly, we're disliked in the world.

I'm happy the BBC started the ball rolling on doing FIFA. Now the best of our British media will collude to begin the process of tearing Blatter's house down.

Even before the vote, David Mellor told Panorama that England's function was not to host the Finals - but in cleaning up the world game, starting with FIFA.

It appears we have that apparatus! Let's totally destroy them using the best investigative powers of our journalist class.

And let's use the sheer power of the English language to get the message across the world that Sepp Blatter needs to be sent into retirement in disgrace and totally stripped of his integrity.

Something good's got to come out of this. Perhaps football can be reclaimed by other stakeholders in and around the game.

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