Some of my greatest regrets in life are things I’ve declined on principle. So in many ways, I’m sorry not to be in Qatar for the World Cup. On reflection, I’d have liked to take a detailed look at the horror show, in situ. I was once extremely close to travelling with Donald Trump’s presidential party and some bad boys of Brexit to Mississippi, where the fash-Wotsit was guest of honour at the opening of a civil rights museum, of all things. Insulting? Disgusting? Grotesque? Obviously. But let me tell you: there would have been plenty to write about. I’d have got 5,000 words out of the plane flight alone.
Fast forward to the present day, then, and I am nearly disappointed not to be seeing one of the great horrors of the sporting/geopolitical age in inglorious technicolour. Then again, how many words are honestly available? It’s possible Fifa has finally contrived to pull off the genuinely unprecedented: a World Cup where, two days out from kick-off, there is only one thing to say about it all.
