Baffling politics

AP

Playing the 2010 World Cup in South Africa would almost literally be dicing with death and even Sepp Blatter seems to see that now.

Within days of one another, two FIFA Presidents, past and present, each elected to the position in deeply controversial circumstances, have made much publicised statements. Joao Havelange, who might well have said with the first of all British Prime Ministers, Sir Robert Walpole (1721-1742) “Every man has his price,” emerged from his blessedly marginalised retirement to assert, bizarrely, that Brazil were cheated out of the 1966 World Cup by English referees. Next, his protege and present incumbent, Sepp Blatter, somewhat more significantly, suddenly made a curiously qualified statement about South Africa and the planned 2010 World Cup finals which has been interpreted as half revealing, half concealing his unease about that tormented country’s ability to host the tournament.

Havelange first. Why he should suddenly break cover to make such daft accusations after 42 years’ delay, who can say? Yet, as one who watched Brazil in that 1966 tournament commit a kind of suicide on the Everton ground when, in their initial qualifying group, they were so soundly beaten by first Hungary then Portugal, I can but assume that the old man’s memory must be failing him.

First, however, let it be readily admitted that when they lost to Portugal, Brazil were very badly served by the inept refereeing of the Englishman, George McCabe. Above all in the torrid incident when the Portuguese defender, Joao Morais, shockingly fouled Pele (no explusion), who was unable to play any relevant part in the rest of the match. Yet, that was not why the Brazilians lost; and no English referee was in charge of their previous defeat by a dazzling Hungarian team.

No, they lost those games because of their bizarre selection policy of gerontophilia. I’d watched them play well enough prior to the tournament in Gothenberg where they beat Sweden in a friendly, with Pele in lively form. Though once in England, it grew clear that Pele was not fully fit. It did meanwhile seem extraordinary that the Brazilians should recall in the centre-backs Bellini and Orlando two men who had played in the World Cup winning team in Sweden eight years earlier. That celebrated maverick right-winger, Garrincha, had played then too, and had looked even better and more versatile in Chile in 1962. But he had had a serious car accident and as the much admired Brazil team doctor, Hilton Gosling, told me, Garrincha could still play, but not too often. He duly scored one of his celebrated free-kick goals in the opener against Bulgaria but then as Dr. Gosling had anticipated, tired.

Like Garrincha, big Djalma Santos, the right-back, had played in the winning World Cup teams of 1958 and 1968, but time inevitably had caught up with him, too. In the games against Hungary and Portugal, these veterans were overrun. For all McCabe’s ineptitude and Pele’s injury, referees really didn’t come into it.

So much for Havelange. But what did Sepp (51 bad new ideas a day you may remember) significantly say? This was it: “I would be a very negligent president if I hadn’t put away in a drawer somewhere a Plan B (for the 2010 World Cup venue). However, only a natural catastrophe would change things. If we had to activate the Plan B, we would take our decision after the Confederation Cup.” Due to be played in South Africa in June 2009.

You don’t have to read too assiduously between the lines to realise that Blatter has implicitly been suggesting that the World Cup could be taken away from South Africa. Which should never have been chosen in the first place. Almost every week we are presented with new horrifying statistics of the murder rate in South Africa, not to mention the appalling rape rate. Most of the big cities seem almost lawless. What kind of criterion could the Confederations Cup be, a small scale competition indifferently supported by comparison with the massive World Cup and the multitude of fans? Fans, who above all, will surely be in danger of robbery, even murder. All very well for the teams, their officials, the media to be ferried around in escorted coaches. Fans won’t have that privilege. And there have, for some time now, been very grave doubts about South Africa’s ability to provide the huge sophisticated communications network which this overblown and over populated competition now requires.

By odd coincidence, Blatter’s indiscretion occurred almost contemporaneously with the news that New Zealand’s Charlie Dempsey, 86, had died. The man who famously or as his detractors would say notoriously saw to it that the 2006 World Cup went not to South Africa but to Germany who predictably made an excellent job of it. Dempsey was encharged by New Zealand’s association to vote for South Africa. But in the event he abstained which meant the vote was not deadlocked; which would have left the casting vote to Blatter who wanted South Africa. He’d later say that he was afraid of the reaction if he voted for either country.

Subsequently, FIFA did vote for the South Africans. Now at last there does seem to be a glimmer of light. Playing the tournament there would almost literally be dicing with death and even Blatter, with his endless courting of African football, seems to see that now.

A pity the 53 members of UEFA, hard on the heels of such a lively and successful European Championship, should have voted unanimously to increase the number of contesting teams to 24 in 2016. And just think this is a competition which began with just four finalists. Then in due course eight. Now 16. Not a wholly unreasonable number; as the recent tournament showed, the general level was high. But as we have seen all too clearly in recent World Cups, the more teams you let in, the more you debase the quality.

As a matter of record, the expansion was proposed by the Chairman of the Scottish Football Association, Gordon Smith. The very Gordon Smith who, in the last minute of a Wembley FA Cup Final, missed a sitter of a chance for modest Brighton. Due to be relegated from the top division, which would have beaten mighty Manchester United. Still, if it hadn’t been Smith it would doubtless have been some other European President. Why don’t the players themselves, the millionaire stars, protect against this added demand on their already taxed physical resources? Michel Platini, recently-elected President of UEFA, shouting off ideas like a Sepp Blatter, had nothing to say about this. More’s the pity.