MARTIN SAMUEL: England stars can criticise Qatar now but that ship has long sailed

Harry Kane and Gareth Southgate spoke well, as they often do. Nice words. Well-intentioned words. But just words, as always.

Kane revealed that England players had gathered this week and talked about issues around the World Cup in Qatar and maybe, in the future, there will be more eloquent speeches, and maybe a branded T-shirt, but here’s the reality. In 2018, the Football Association signed a memorandum of understanding with Qatar.

‘The FA is pleased to commit to this knowledge-sharing partnership with the Qatar Football Association,’ said then-chairman Greg Clarke. His sentiments were echoed by Ajay Sharma, who remains the British ambassador there. ‘I am delighted that the English Football Association has signed memorandums of understanding with the Qatar Football Association and the Supreme Committee for Delivery and Legacy,’ he said.

Harry Kane and Gareth Southgate’s words about the issues facing the Qatar World Cup are well-intentioned and articulated but do very little in reality 

So let’s not kid ourselves. We’re going to do nothing that matters. Nothing that makes a difference. The ship sailed long ago.

Having seen the way Russia were drummed out of the World Cup because their qualifying opponents refused, point blank, to play them, we now know the opportunity missed.

Had the most powerful nations in world football refused to entertain FIFA’s corrupt award of the 2022 World Cup to Qatar, we might not need to be considering human rights and repression quite so intently. This didn’t happen, because football is utterly in thrall to Qatar.

From the FA’s memorandum, to the many leagues that are funded by Qatari broadcaster beIN Sports — including the Premier League, with a deal worth roughly £380million running until 2025 — to clubs like Bayern Munich who have strong financial links with the country, elite football is entirely complicit here.

There was a chance to reject this World Cup in its infancy, and even a legitimate legal argument to do so, once FIFA moved its place in the schedule from summer. Yet no one of influence was the slightest bit interested.

Qatar will host the 2022 World Cup between 21 November and 18 December next year

Kane and a few of the lads may talk tolerance — Raheem Sterling claimed they were previously discouraged by the FA — and that’s admirable. But they’ll be heard in all the countries where that isn’t the issue and not in Qatar, which will continue to be ruled by its many Supreme Committees. The Supremes are rarely a good sign. Dictatorships and Darth Vader tend to have Supreme in their titles.

FIFA, the brazen crooks who delivered this travesty to the world, are now talking human rights concerns with Amnesty International.

It’s shameless. A modern form of slave labour has built the stadiums, the hotels and the infrastructure and now the work is close to completed, Qatar has introduced laws giving workers more freedom and better status.

No doubt FIFA will be very impressed with this and might even try to claim credit, but it’s too late. The damage was done the day Qatar got the gig and in the many years that followed when FIFA, and football, did nothing to help the migrant workers delivering this jamboree.

Last year, Amnesty International documented the failure to investigate thousands of deaths among migrant labour that may have been caused by unsafe conditions. Little has improved. This tournament already stands on a foundation of skeletons; and only now are FIFA discussing it.

Here was more corruption hiding in plain sight. England’s proposed World Cup base has links to Al-Qaeda, we are informed. The Tivoli Souq Al Wakra was bankrolled by Qatar’s Private Engineering Office, named last year as the source of a money laundering operation to fund jihadists. Should this surprise? Eight years ago to the day, in this column, the following information appeared.

Qatar’s International Labour Organisation found 50 immigrant workers died last year alone

‘Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was “the principle architect of the 9/11 attacks” according to the United States Commission Report. He worked as a project engineer for the Qatari Ministry of Electricity and Water between 1992 and 1996, and lived for some of that time on a farm belonging to government official Abdullah bin Khalid al Thani, Qatar’s Minister of Interior from 2001 to June 2013, including the time of the successful World Cup bid.

‘Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is now detained awaiting trial for his part in the 9/11 attacks, the 1993 assault on the World Trade Centre, the Bali bombings and the beheading of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl. Abdullah bin Khalid al Thani was thought by former US counter-terrorism director Richard Clarke to have “great sympathy for Osama Bin Laden and great sympathy for terrorist groups”. He revealed al Thani was “using his personal money and ministry money to transfer to Al-Qaeda front groups that were allegedly charities”. And he was part of the government that won the 2022 World Cup bid.’

So there were various reasons, at various times, to push back against a World Cup in Qatar.

It’s hard for players to refuse to go, although not impossible as a collective, but had an entire confederation, such as UEFA, or a collection of countries including those that make the tournament complete, taken against it, who knows what might have been possible?

Instead, appeaser Greg Clarke had in his hand a piece of paper: a memorandum of understanding.

The next time the players are discussing Qatar, human rights and the power of protest, they might want to begin there.

Greg Clarke signed a memorandum of understanding with Qatar when he was chairman of FA

YES FA GOT SEMIS WRONG BUT HOW DARE RAILWAYS SHUT DOWN FOR EASTER

Somebody at the FA messed up mightily the day they scheduled the 2022 FA Cup semi-finals for Easter weekend. If Network Rail told the governing body in 2019 that the West Coast main line would be shut throughout that time, the decision to play two huge matches at Wembley across those dates was greatly insensitive.

It was 2003 the last time the FA Cup semi-finals did not include a club situated on the West Coast main line. Arsenal, Sheffield United, Watford and Southampton got there that year. Since then there have been 76 semi-finalists and 32 of them would have been affected by this Network Rail closure — or 42.1 per cent.

In 2011, all four finalists would have had a problem — Bolton, Stoke, Manchester City and Manchester United — and in nine of the years there were at least two clubs present from the North West or West Midlands. In 2009, 2011, 2016 and now 2022 there was one tie with both clubs from the region; and since Wembley began hosting both semi-final ties in 2008, there has always been at least one team on the West Coast main line in attendance.

So scheduling the matches when they did was always a significant risk and there is no surprise supporters of Liverpool and Manchester City are up in arms. Even so, aren’t Network Rail getting off rather lightly?

For it isn’t just football fans who might want to move about the country on Easter weekend. What of those visiting family, or friends, or taking advantage of the long weekend for a holiday? How dare they shut off a whole swathe of the isle? 

The imperious way our transport executives treat us is appalling. And then the public are patronised in censorious tones by the green lobby for using their cars. The FA have got this very wrong; but it shouldn’t really be a problem they are so regularly forced to consider.

NO SURPRISE IF BARTY COMES BACK TO PARTY

Ash Barty has made her call, and is no doubt very happy. Elite sport is demanding, and if she is not committed, her career will only go one way.

She is not the first tennis player to quit at the top either. Martina Hingis, Justine Henin, Kim Clijsters and Bjorn Borg all did the same.

They all, however, later made comebacks. Borg and Henin never recovered their peak form, yet Clijsters won the US Open and Hingis became a brilliant doubles player, winning four Grand Slam women’s doubles, six Grand Slam mixed doubles, 27 WTA titles and an Olympic silver medal. 

In time, Barty may find she misses it as her predecessors did, and retirement turns into a sabbatical. Naturally in professional sport, there are physical and mental stresses, pressure to perform and the travelling is hard. Still, it’s not the worst life, playing tennis.

Ash Barty retired from tennis but we should not be surprised to see her change her mind 

WHY LIVERPOOL TRANSFER GURU WOULD BE WASTED AT PSG

There is little point in Paris SaintGermain attempting to lure sporting director Michael Edwards from Liverpool, if they continue to be obsessed with marquee names at the expense of team dynamic. 

What made Edwards’ recruitment policies at Liverpool outstanding was that they were not influenced by fame or fashion. 

Liverpool were as likely to buy from Hull or Southampton as one of Europe’s elite clubs, and whereas their forward line is balanced and complements its many talents, PSG have put three of the greatest players in the world together, and underwhelmed. 

Edwards has to be allowed to do recruitment his way in Paris, or his appointment has no purpose. 

Michael Edwards, left, is thought to be on a shortlist to become PSG’s sporting director

NOT ALL SPENDING’S EQUAL IN FOOTBALL

Just 761 were at the women’s FA Cup quarter-final between Arsenal and Coventry last week; 1,214 attended Manchester City versus Everton. In the previous round, 180 made it to West Brom, and 402 saw Reading play West Ham. Yet the prize money for the competition will increase to £3million next season.

‘Women’s football is in a growth phase and we are always looking to make investment to drive it forward,’ said Sue Campbell of the FA.

And that’s understandable. Yet isn’t it peculiar that if the owner of a Premier League club concludes, quite reasonably, that he wishes to drive growth through investment there are hundreds of rules to block him. In the men’s game, investment is now a dirty word. Financial doping, it is called.

Of course, the growth of an individual club is different from the growth of a sport, in which everyone benefits. Yet if we believe investment creates progress, why work so hard on thwarting it with red tape?

One imagines Russia’s bid to host Euro 2028 is merely a domestic propaganda exercise, trying to normalise the invasion of Ukraine.

It pretends to the Russian public that the country remains part of the international community and spineless UEFA then behave as if the bid must be entertained as part of their process. Yet what would send a clear message about Russia’s status is if they were simply expelled from UEFA. 

Equally, far from wasting an estimated £10million in promotion as may now happen, the British and Irish bid team should not spend a solitary penny. Everyone knows what this bid is about and the stadiums and cities are ready. UEFA either wants in, or it doesn’t. Good luck otherwise.

Russia bid to host Euro 2028 but it appears to be purely for propoganda reasons

Edleen John, diversity consultant to the England football team, is subject to a widening investigation over workplace bullying. A probe after one initial complaint appears to have found sufficient grounds for a formal inquiry that may end in disciplinary action. 

‘I hope the leeway and scope that we as a society afford strong, opinionated and vocal black women continues to grow with me,’ said John in her initial statement. 

This self-aggrandising talk, particularly of leeway, smacks of a wish for a free pass. If John is shown to be a bully she does not merit that and the FA need to treat her as it would any other employee. 

TIRED OF GOALPOST GOONS? TELL VINCE 

Dale Vince, owner of Forest Green Rovers, is one of the funders of the Just Stop Oil campaign. 

He said he didn’t know protesters would be tying themselves to goalposts at Premier League matches but, now they are, finds it quite amusing. ‘I don’t really have a problem with what they are doing as long as it is non-violent,’ he said. ‘Disruption is part and parcel of protest.’ 

Indeed it is. So if you do wish to protest against Vince-funded protesters believing it is their right to interfere with the lives of working-class men and women who have scant influence on the problem and just want to go to a football match, feel free to pop along to Forest Green Rovers, maybe on a match day morning, and superglue all their turnstiles and locks together. 

Keep it non-violent and no doubt Vince will understand. 

Dale Vince found it amusing when a protestor tied himself to the goalpost at Goodison Park

Newcastle have ruled out expensive or superstar signings in the summer. The official line is that they want to build with ‘pragmatic ambition’. Then again, they weren’t going to do much in the January transfer window — but ended up spending £94million. 

And Amanda Staveley bought the club with her own money, until it transpired that most of it was borrowed. Let’s see what the summer brings before saluting Newcastle’s pragmatism. 

It was said the Saudi Media Group getting control of Chelsea would have reflected badly on the Government. 

Not as much as if the bid that includes Conservative peer Lord Coe successfully swoops in. Still, it would afford a glimpse of how Government regulation for football might work.