Comment by PaulRobinson
1 hour ago
- The number of teams expanding weakened the group stage to a point of being ignorable
- The extraordinary pricing of the tickets
- "Hydration breaks" to cater for TV advertising
- The US red card being rescinded after a phone call from an interested party
- Argentina's free pass throughout
FIFA has been corrupt since the days of João Havelange, although his stance was broadly to bring football to more countries and just needed a way to finance that (enter stage left, Coca-Cola, and stage right, Adidas and ISL), but it started getting really wild after him.
It's gone unchecked. There was talk of the English FA pulling out of UEFA and FIFA some years ago, as there was a perception the soul of the game had been tarnished by both orgs.
This is a good first step, and I hope FIFA gets itself sorted. I hope UEFA also gets its house in order.
Ticket prices for all events anywhere will not come back down unless we make international travel harder. There were Taylor Swift fans who flew to every concert of one of her tours. When I attended the Hungaroring Grand Prix every single person seemed to be visiting from outside Hungary. Hosting in the wealthiest country of size of course made this worse but I predict ticket prices for popular events will only keep going up and up.