“The situation makes you angry. How can it not?” asked Jurgen Klopp. It is no secret that he is a critic of a winter World Cup, but his anger was not merely a consequence of the congested fixture list or the injuries that seem to have resulted from it.
The Liverpool manager is aggrieved about the initial award of the tournament to Qatar, amid a backdrop of alleged corruption within the Qatari bid that continues to be denied. There is also the lack of scrutiny he feels their bid attracted both before it succeeded and since, and the human rights implications of building stadia in the scorching heat of the summer. He feels it is unfair to ask footballers and managers to make political stances when he believes the media failed. He laments the controversial vote in 2010, to the subterfuge and lack of accountability when many of the 21 voters were indicted or found guilty of corruption or banned for ethics violations.
