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Australia has lost its bid to host the 2022 soccer World Cup: our three-year, $45 million campaign garnered just one of the 22 votes of FIFA’s governing board.
The 2022 honour goes to the fictional desert kingdom of Qatar. Qatar won thanks to a promise to bring peace to the Middle East and a commitment to air-conditioning the entire country for the duration of the tournament.
FIFA found Qatar’s promise of peace in the Middle East more believable than Australia’s promise of Australians giving a shit about soccer.
Fun fact: Other countries call soccer “kickball” or something.
Central to Australia’s humiliation was a seven-minute presentation featuring a kangaroo defying Prime Minister Julia Gillard to steal the World Cup trophy from its home in Zürich.
Ms Gillard later claimed that the kangaroo was “entitled to its private views” but reiterated that her leadership was secure.
The video used advanced CGI to simulate what it would look like if:
Fun fact: In soccer, you can hit the ball with any part of your body apart from your hands: feet, knees, head, chest… even nutsack.
Australian soccer fans had hoped that the involvement of mall tycoon Frank Lowy would make the presentation classy and engaging, like Westfield Bondi Junction, but instead it became tacky and ill-thought-out, like Westfield Sydney.
Fun fact: In Australia, soccer is the most popular women’s sport played by men.
It is now thought that Australia’s bid should have emphasised that many of our ethnic minorities actually enjoy playing the game, making it one of our top four football codes. Although very woggy, the sport is now acknowledged to have originated in England, after excavations in East Anglia found the skeleton of a man faking a leg injury.
As a consolation, Melbourne beat zero other cities to host the 2022 AFL World Cup.
Ms Gillard later claimed that the kangaroo was "entitled to its private views".
