Soccer
Ryan Lambert
I'm going to guess that it's not a good thing when the president of FIFA has to acknowledge that the country slated to host the most important sporting event in the world has completely bungled every step of its planning.
Just two years away from South Africa hosting the 2010 World Cup, it appears we've hit a snag. It's not just the stadium construction delays, worries about transportation and security, or fears that the nation cannot handle the huge flow of humanity from every corner of the globe. It is, in fact, South African officials' flat denials that such things exist.
Danny Jordaan, the CEO of the South African committee organizing the event, has said that there is no backup plan and never was. He was contradicted by FIFA president Sepp Blatter a few days later.
"I would be a very negligent president if I hadn't put away in a drawer somewhere a Plan B," Blatter said.
He added that next June's Confederations Cup, also hosted in South Africa, will serve as a dress rehearsal, and any Plan B-related decision will be made after that.
This ignores several things. For one, just one of nine stadiums the tournament would use has been completed. For another, South Africa is the violent crimes capital of the world per capita, and is the runaway leader in manslaughters, assaults, and rapes. Not surprisingly, the nation also has a history of soccer-related rioting and violence.
That South Africa is hosting at all was a consequence of FIFA's ridiculous, although now defunct, rotation policy that required each continent to host the World Cup before the first can host again. South Africa's main competition for the 2010 tournament? Vacation destinations Libya, Egypt, Morocco and Tunisia.
If Plan B is to be implemented, it's an absolute certainty that only a handful of countries are on the emergency short list: the United States, England, and possibly China, if it convincingly pulls off the Olympics.
England will host the Olympics in 2012 and will likely have enough infrastructure in place to ensure a smooth, if hurried, transition. But it is also putting together a huge bid to host the World Cup in 2018, so FA officials would have to seriously weigh the cost-benefit of bailing out FIFA now or doing the tournament their way eight years later.
China will certainly have the stadia and infrastructure left over from this summer's Olympics, and would be able handle the influx of soccer fans. Soccer is also the nation's fastest-growing sport and it has a number of stadiums that can hold enough people to meet FIFA specifications.
But a Chinese World Cup is almost a certainty within the next three or four tournament cycles, and it's doubtful that FIFA would take the risk of giving its premier event to a country that has already struggled with its Olympic preparations (to say nothing of the political concerns that surround it).
But the clear choice is the United States, with three major world tournaments (1994 World Cup and 1999 and 2003 Women's World Cups) and pretty much every CONCACAF Gold Cup under its belt in the last 14 years.
All were very successful, especially the much-heralded 1994 tournament, which has the highest average attendance of any World Cup ever (69,000 per game, 3.6 million total).
No country's federation has the infrastructure or ability to scramble like the USSF, nor does any country have the number of serviceable stadiums. Nine of the world's 20 largest stadiums are in the United States, and only three of South Africa's stadiums are going to hold more than 50,000 people. Only one has been completed.
The U.S., meanwhile, can accommodate that many in literally 97 stadiums across the country, and it has four stadiums which can hold more than 95,000 people, bigger than the as yet unfinished Soccer City stadium in the South African capital of Johannesburg.
No country will be safer for foreign fans, and no country can host as many. The only concern, one supposes, would be the vast distances between venues, which would make attending only a few games possible for most fans.
But as far as I'm concerned, the choice is clear. Another World Cup in the U.S. would be a smashing success. A South African version would only be an embarrassment.
Ryan Lambert is an Eagle-Tribune sportswriter. E-mail him at rlambert@eagletribune.com.
Future World Cup sites:
2010: South Africa?
2014: Brazil
2018: Undecided (England, Australia, Qatar, Russia, Portugal/Spain, and Belgium/Netherlands/Luxembourg have tabled bids)
2022: Undecided (China, the U.S., and Australia are reportedly considering bids)
Note: the 2018 and 2022 World Cup bids close next year and hosts will be decided before June 2011.
