By now, it is very clear that the chances of the 2022 World Cup being hosted in the summer are next to none. In light of the potential hazards posed to players and fans, a summer World Cup, despite Qatar’s ambitious claims of air-conditioned stadiums, is not feasible and so FIFA have had, to varying degrees of controversy, bend the rules to accommodate a World Cup in Qatar. Right now, the most likely option will see the World Cup held in November- December. According to FIFA, this beats all the options on table in terms of scheduling. The proposed January- February 2022 suggestion was deemed unworkable as it clashed with the Winter Olympics while the May-June option, championed mainly by UEFA, was also discarded by FIFA. To all intents and purposes and subject to ratification by FIFA’s executive committee, the 2022 World Cup will be held in November and December, 2022.
Potential problems of a winter World Cup
A Lot has been said about the potential problems of a shift from the usual summer dates and they revolve around two central issues: the global football calendar and broadcast deals.
A winter World Cup will see European league schedules decimated as the event will happen DURING usual football season and thus wreck untold havoc on the usual calendar. UEFA, having the biggest and most lucrative leagues in the world in its jurisdiction, will be most affected as well with the last few UEFA Champions League group stage matches scrapped and rescheduled. There is also the question of how much breaks players will require before and after the event before usual league activities resume. Primarily, Africa will be affected mainly via its flagship football event, the AFCON (more on this later).
In terms of television deals, again, the spotlight is firmly on UEFA and its member nations’ leagues. The English Premier League, only a few days ago, announced a new deal of $7.9 billion for its 2016-2019 window and seeing as the 2021-2022 season, during which the Qatar 2022 World Cup will be played, falls into the Premier League’s next round of negotiations (since 2001 the Premier League has negotiated television deals based on three year windows), the road to harmonizing schedules and keeping television rights buyers and holders happy is fraught with pitfalls. Since 1992, the Premier League’s television rights have dropped in value only once ( between 2004 and 2007) and it is safe to say that given that the last two negotiation rounds have seen a cumulative 140 percent rise in the value of the rights, the next rights purchase agreement will surpass the current $7.9 billion. The other big three leagues in Europe also have big money television deals (Bundesliga: $770 million per year, La Liga: $860 million, Serie A: $1.1 billion per year) to work around in a bid to make a November- December 2022 World Cup work. Surely, the bean counters who sign these cheques will not be pleased by FIFA’s interference?
How does Africa fit in?
A winter World in November- December 2022 will adversely affect the African Cup of Nations scheduled to hold from January to February 2023 in Guinea. First, it is near impossible that Europe’s biggest clubs will agree to allow some of their best players leave first for a month-long global football party and then only two weeks later allow them leave for a regional one. Even though the release of players from international competitions is governed by FIFA, it is imagined that having already severely inconvenienced the clubs by holding the World Cup right in the middle of their regular seasons, the body will have little or no political will to coerce the same clubs to release players for another month. The resulting dilemma leaves only one option: the rescheduling of the 2023 African Cup of Nations. Interestingly, it appears that this outcome has already been ratified by the powers that be. Earlier this week, FIFA’s Secretary General Jerome Valcke confirmed that the Confederation of African Football has already provisionally agreed to a shift of the 2023 AFCON.
“The African confederation has automatically and nicely agreed it will not organize the Nations Cup in January 2023. It will have to postpone the Africa Cup of Nations to June,” he said. Similarly, Spokesman of CAF, Junior Binyam is also quoted by the BBC as saying CAF is “100% behind the the proposals of the task force and will adjust its calendar accordingly.”
While CAF’s selflessness is admirable in some quarters, the folly of it is clear to others. The African Nations Cup has been held predominantly in the January-February window to allow for maximally favourable weather conditions and as such CAF’s rather feeble concession to FIFA clearly has the potential to hurt its own premium asset, the AFCON. The potential danger which a June AFCON presents is underlined by the fact that the monsoon season in Guinea, hosts of the 2023 tournament, kicks off in June.
Also, it is unlikely that CAF has already established a broadcast rights agreement for the 2023 (agreements for future tournaments are commonplace; FIFA already have a deal with FOX for the 2026 World Cup), so the body will not be encumbered by tweaking those details but asides the hazards presented by mother nature, CAF may be unwittingly tying itself into a knot. Earlier this year, CAF announced sanctions of around $10 million on Morocco for reneging on a hosting agreement for the 2015 AFCON. In the weeks before the event and before new emergency hosts were announced, CAF insisted, repeatedly, after Morocco’s request for the tournament to be changed from the original January-February dates that it will not entertain any request for date changes as the January- February period is sacrosanct.
However, with the current disposition of CAF and their lack of resistance to the possible rescheduling of the 2023 AFCON, Morocco’s appeal of the sanctions (to be heard by the Court of Arbitration of Sports) will gain an interesting twist.
In all, the 2022 World Cup will leave its mark and most likely, as the world prepares for a first winter World Cup, Africa will be preparing for a first summer AFCON in living memory.- either way, history will be made and Africa will be placed firmly at the centre of it all.
