The football World Cup is the biggest sporting event in the global calendar … ahead even of the Olympics.
More than five billion people are expected to tune in to watch the sporting spectacular in Qatar, with more than a million turning up to watch the games in person.
From ticket and merchandise sales to corporate sponsorship, prize money and tourism, there are immense amounts of money kicking around an event like this.
But, for a host country, is it financially worth it? The short answer is no.
Most countries hosting a World Cup spend tens of billions on preparations, developing infrastructure, building hotels and so on. Much of that is often not recouped, at least not in terms of hard cash.
The World Cup certainly is a money-spinner. TV rights for the 2018 World Cup in Russia were sold to broadcasters around the world for $4.6bn. But that is kept by FIFA, football’s world governing body.
As are ticket sales, which are owned by a subsidiary company 100 percent owned by FIFA. Marketing rights, which brought in more than $1bn in the 2018 cycle are, too, kept by FIFA.
The body does, however, cover the principal costs of running the tournament – it will be paying Qatar in the region of $1.7bn, though that includes a $440m prize pot for teams.
But Qatar is understood to have spent in excess of $200bn on this World Cup and the infrastructure around it – hotels and leisure facilities, overhauling its entire road network and constructing a rail system.
With more than a million overseas visitors expected during the month-long tournament, a host country will see a tourism spike, increasing sales for hoteliers, restaurateurs and the like. But such a surge requires extra capacity to be built, the expense of which is usually far larger than the revenues generated short term.
And who benefits in the short term?
The World Economic Forum reports: “Hotel prices rise during sell-out events, but wages of service workers do not necessarily go up by the same amount, meaning the returns to capital are likely greater than those to labour.”
People with money make money. People without it, don’t.
Furthermore, World Cup tourists buying merchandise, drinks or anything else from FIFA partner brands are not contributing to a host country’s tax revenues, as enormous tax breaks for FIFA and its sponsor brands are required within a World Cup bidding process.
Germany touted $272m in tax breaks in its bid to host the 2006 World Cup.
Non-World Cup tourists tend to stay well clear of a host country during a World Cup, keen to avoid the crowds, traffic and inflated prices. For Qatar 2022, if you don’t have a match ticket, you are unable to enter the country from November 1 to the end of the World Cup.
In the short term at least, it doesn’t make financial sense to host a football World Cup. But some things are bigger than money.
Hosting a World Cup is an exercise in the projection of soft power. It gives the world a window into that country, showing how new infrastructure makes it a good place in which to invest or to do business.
And in the longer term, the money spent on hosting, if managed correctly, builds capacity for that country’s economy to expand.
New roads and transport projects will provide economic benefits for years after the final whistle is blown at a World Cup.
Huge international sporting events bridge societal divides and bring people together across borders – the 2018 Winter Olympics saw North and South Korea enter the stadium under a common flag. These events also encourage children to take up sport – which has economic benefits to a host nation’s healthcare system further down the line.
For a host country, a World Cup is about pride and honour and publicity, more than it is about making money.
Hosting a World Cup is a nation opening its arms and its homes and saying to the world: “Hayya, you are welcome here.”
PARIS – Canada won its first Paralympic medal in women’s sitting volleyball and ended the country’s team sport podium drought Saturday.
The women’s volleyball team swept Brazil 3-0 (25-15, 25-18, 25-18) to take the bronze medal at North Paris Arena.
The women were the first Canadian side to claim a Paralympic medal in a team sport since the men’s wheelchair basketball team won gold in London in 2012.
“Oh my gosh, literally disbelief, but also, we did it,” said veteran Heidi Peters of Neerlandia, Alta. “It’s indescribable.”
Canada finished seventh in Rio de Janeiro in 2016 and fourth in Tokyo three years ago.
Seven players of the dozen Canadians were Rio veterans and nine returned from the team in Tokyo.
Eleven were members of the squad that earned a silver medal at the 2022 world championship.
“I know how hard every athlete and every staff member and all of our family back home have worked for this moment,” captain Danielle Ellis said.
“It’s been years and years and years in the making, our third Paralympic Games, and we knew we wanted to be there.”
The women earned a measure of revenge on the Brazilians, who beat Canada for bronze in Tokyo and also in a pool game in Paris.
“There’s a lot of history with us and Brazil,” Peters acknowledged. “Today we just knew that we could do it. We were like, ‘This is our time and if we just show up and play our style of volleyball, serving tough and hitting the ball hard, the game will probably going our way.’ And it did.”
Calgary’s Jennifer Oakes led Canada with 10 attack points. Ellis of White Rock, B.C., and Peters each contributed nine.
Canada registered 15 digs as a team to Brazil’s 10.
“Losing to Brazil in the second game was tough,” Ellis said. “It just lit the fire beneath us.”
Canada’s men’s wheelchair basketball team fell 75-62 to Germany in the bronze-medal game in Paris.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 7, 2024.
PARIS – Canadian para canoeist Brianna Hennessy raced to her first Paralympic medal with a reminder of her mother on her paddle.
The 39-year-old from Ottawa took silver in the women’s 200-metre sprint Saturday in Paris.
The design on Hennessy’s paddle includes a cardinal in remembrance of her late mother Norma, the letter “W’ for Wonder Woman and a cat.
“My mother passed away last year, so I said I’d be racing down the course with her,” Hennessy said Saturday at the Vaires-sur-Marne Nautical Stadium.
“In our family, a cardinal represents what our love means. My mum was my Wonder Woman, and this is a cardinal rising up. This is our family pet that passed away two months after my mum, of cancer, because I think their love was together.
“All this represents so much to me, so it’s my passion piece for Paris.”
Hennessy finished just over a second behind gold medallist Emma Wiggs of Britain in the women’s VL2 Va’a, which is a canoe that has a support float and is propelled with a single-blade paddle.
Hennessy’s neck was broken when she was struck by a speeding taxi driver in Toronto in 2014 when she was 30. She has tetraplegia, which is paralysis in her arms and legs.
“This year’s the 10-year anniversary of my accident,” Hennessy said. “I should have been dead. I’ve been fighting back ever since.
“This is the pinnacle of it all for me and everything I’ve been fighting for. It made it all worth it.”
After placing fifth in her Paralympic debut in Tokyo three years ago, Hennessy was a silver medallist in the last three straight world championships in the event.
She will race the women’s kayak single Sunday. Hennessy and Wiggs have a tradition of hugging after races.
“I always talk about the incredible athletes here, and how the Paralympics means so much more because everyone here has a million reasons to give up, and we’ve all chosen to just go on,” the Canadian said. “It’s more about the camaraderie.”
Hennessy boxed and played hockey and rugby before she was hit by the taxi.
She was introduced to wheelchair rugby by the Ottawa Hospital Rehabilitation Centre.
She eventually turned to paddling at the Ottawa River Canoe Club, which led her to the Paralympic podium in Paris.
“It has a good ring to it,” Hennessy said. “I’m so happy. I feel like we’ve had to overcome so much to get here, especially in the last year and a half. I’m just so proud.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 7, 2024.
