The World Cup

[poliphilo]

The BBC was talking last night about our "failure" to win the rights to stage the World Cup and the need for an inquest to "determine what went wrong"- very much as if we were entitled to it and had had it snatched from under our noses. I think it's fairly obvious that what went wrong is that our bribes weren't big enough. 

Anyway, we'll be staging the next Olympics. How many international sporting events do we think we deserve? 

Comments

[butterscotch711.livejournal.com]

Australia's 2022 bidding team is right now very embarrassed about its dismal failure (we got 1 vote in the first round)

http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/blogs/balls/we-shouldnt-be-embarrassed-by-cup-defeat-but-others-should/20101203-18iiw.html

After the Sydney Olympics we have had no idea how to project ourselves internationally, and I think that largely motivated our bid, which people were very (very unrealistically) optimistic about.

Hosting these huge world sporting events is kind of nationally addictive. In all the breathless hope and jealousy people fail to take in just how ineffective, uneconomical a way of projecting soft power they are.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

You did a good job in Sydney. The opening and closing ceremonies were fun- much pleasanter than the Chinese ones- which I found chilling in their subordination of the individual to the mass.

Also you have such glorious scenery.