The World Cup starts on Monday: here are some facts to get you ready for the world’s biggest sports tournament
Lesson summary
Hi there everyone, I’m Jeff and this is Plain English, lesson number 521 for Thursday, November 17, 2022. That means we are getting close to the opening ceremonies of the World Cup next week. I will watch some of the games. If you’ve been listening long enough, you’ve heard my thoughts on the foolishness, waste, and corruption of the Olympics and World Cup. I do try to put that out of my mind during the games themselves. So today, we’ll get ready for the most-watched sporting tournament of the world. The expression is “risk it” and we have a song of the week.
JR has uploaded today’s full lesson to PlainEnglish.com/521. Let’s get going.
World Cup starts on Monday
The World Cup is the most-watched sporting tournament in the world. Thirty-two country teams compete in a multi-round tournament every four years. This will be the twenty-second World Cup; FIFA, the organizing body of soccer, began hosting the World Cup in 1930. The location changes every time; this year’s tournament will be in the small, scorching-hot Middle Eastern nation of Qatar .
And for that reason, this will be the first World Cup held in November, which is winter in the Northern Hemisphere. The tournament has always been held in mid-year, around June. But temperatures in Qatar can reach 50 degrees Celsius in June, so tournament organizers moved it to November, when daily high temperatures are closer to 25 or 30 degrees Celsius.
With a population of less than three million, Qatar is one of the smallest countries to host a World Cup. Recent hosts include Russia, Brazil, South Africa, and Germany—each one many times the size of Qatar. The first tournament was in Uruguay, which, in terms of population, is similar to Qatar today.
This World Cup will be spread across only eight stadiums. There will be sixty-four games in total, and most tournaments have many more stadiums. Before planning the World Cup, Qatar had a total of one stadium suitable for game play; it constructed seven more from scratch . Two are in Doha, the capital, but the other six are within easy commuting distance. One advantage to a small-country host is that it’s easy for visitors to get from one stadium to the next. All stadiums are within a 55-kilometer radius of Doha.
These seven new stadiums, by the way, are air conditioned. Now if you’re picturing an enclosed stadium…that’s not exactly right. Qatar is air-conditioning stadiums with open roofs. To do this, they’re creating a bubble of air that will be kept at 21 degrees Celsius; fans and players will be in the bubble. An airflow system captures rising air, sucks it back down into the stadium, cools it with cold water, and blasts it out again at field level and in the stands. Sensors will adjust the cold-air flow to account for seats in the sun and in the shade. If you’re worried about the environmental impact of this, Qatar assures us the tournament will be carbon-neutral. The air conditioning will be powered by a massive solar energy farm nearby.
Qatar built a new metro system, 100 hotels, and several new roads in preparation for this four-week event.
Every World Cup has its own official ball. This one is by adidas and the design is called Al Rihla Pro, which means “the journey” in Arabic.
Each squad will have 26 men; this has increased from 23 in the past.
Video replay will be used again this year. A new system will help referees make offsides calls faster; the system includes 12 cameras that track the ball and all players.
Going into the tournament, Brazil has the best odds to win, followed by France, England, and Argentina. Four-time winner Italy failed to qualify this year. Qatar’s national team will be playing; they qualified as host country.
If you’re planning your trip to Qatar, there are a few things you might want to know before you get on that flight. Number one, drinking alcohol is illegal in Qatar. So, obviously, is being drunk. The penalty is a fine of $850 and six months in jail. I do not know if Qatari jails are air-conditioned, but I wouldn’t count on it . There will be no alcohol served at the stadiums, but the Qatari government will set up “designated areas” where fans can legally consume alcohol. Nothing says a good time like a “designated area” right?
Promoting same-sex relationships is illegal in Qatar. Some hotels on FIFA’s recommended list were refusing to accept reservations from same-sex couples, but they were later reprimanded. The government will not be setting up designated areas where free speech on same-sex relationships is allowed; however, they have graciously promised not to arrest same-sex couples for holding hands. I still wouldn’t risk it .
Soccer or football?
Soccer or football? In the U.S., we call the game “soccer;” in Britain, they call it football. And in most of the world, it’s some variation on that word, football. However, it’s not only America that calls it soccer. And if you want a refresher on that, you can check out Lesson 55 , where we talked about where people say soccer and where they say football.
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