Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud. WANA NEWS AGENCY (via Portal)
The way is clear for Spain, Portugal and Morocco to organize the 2030 World Cup after Saudi Arabia decided to withdraw its candidacy, something this newspaper had already put forward when the Moroccans joined the Spanish, Portuguese and Ukraine due to problems the president descended his federation with justice. The Saudi proposal to join Greece and Egypt to become the first World Cup to be held simultaneously on three continents (Asia-Europe-Africa) ended up falling to a tripartite alliance that was divided with the inclusion of Morocco in the African vote. Saudi Arabia wanted to pay the Greeks and Egyptians for the infrastructure, but gave up. This was clarified by Saudi Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud, who in the last few hours has been contacting his fellow travelers to tell them that they will give up and not submit their candidacy given the strength of the project led by the Spanish Federation along with the Portuguese and the Moroccans. This treble candidacy is the big favorite against Uruguay, Argentina, Chile and Paraguay. The great asset here is the mystique of the celebrations of the 100th anniversary of the first World Cup, held in Uruguay in 1930, but organizationally it lags far behind those of Spain, Portugal and Morocco.
A few months ago, the Saudi government announced its willingness to host the World Cup with a plan to “create quality opportunities and an attractive environment for investments in the sports sector, to achieve a sustainable sports economy and to raise the level of professionalism and governance “. and finances in sports clubs, in addition to raising the level of clubs and developing their infrastructure in order to offer sports fans the best services. Another goal was to get the Saudi league in the top 10 competitions in the world, which is what they focused on after the arrival of Cristiano Ronaldo (Al-Nassr). Now Benzema and Kanté (Al-Ittihad) have made it. They wanted to turn these signings into the best claim and World Cup propaganda. In fact, the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia and Prime Minister Mohamed bin Salmán announced a national plan to develop the sport. notably football, and four of its clubs (Al-Hilal, Al-Nassr, Al-Ittihad and Al-Ahli) will be 75% owned by the Public Investment Fund. Or, which is the same, they have to sign a huge budget. But understand, winning the race to host a world championship is still not enough.
After carefully examining the real possibilities, Saudi Arabia has come to the conclusion that it cannot prevail against the candidacy of Spain-Portugal-Morocco as it has a huge advantage over them after years of work. An argument for the Spanish Football Federation’s diplomatic strategy led by President Luis Rubiales. The winner will be announced at the end of 2024. The headquarters will be determined in spring 2024 by a vote of all FIFA associations (211).
You can follow EL PAÍS Deportes on Facebook and Twitteror sign up here to receive our weekly newsletter.