The announcements were big when Qatar applied for the 2022 World Cup, but the reality is different: a broken stadium promise, trouble over compensation for workers, a missing women’s national team – little of the promises remain.
Anyone driving from Doha airport towards the city center these days will pass a building that shouldn’t have been standing for a long time. The 974 Stadium, which was built for the 2022 World Cup in Qatar – from 974 recycled shipping containers – was actually supposed to be dismantled after the tournament and shipped to developing countries. That’s what the organizer loudly announced. Instead, four group games of the Arab Cup took place there, which ended on Thursday.
Other of the eight World Cup arenas were actually partially dismantled, but are still completely oversized for the country of 3 million inhabitants. It doesn’t help much that FIFA continues to diligently award tournaments to the emirate – most recently the 2026 finalissima between European champions Spain and South American champions Argentina, which is scheduled to be played in Doha in March.
In the last few months alone, the U17 World Cup (104 games, 103 of which took place on the Aspire Zone training grounds), the Arab Cup and the Intercontinental Cup took place in Qatar – some with good spectator numbers. Attendance in the domestic league, on the other hand, is weak. During regular operations, the games usually do not take place in the large World Cup arenas.
But it’s not just the stadiums where the reality is different than Qatar promised when it applied to host the stadium. An analysis.
Women’s national team
FIFA stipulates the promotion of women’s football as a criterion for countries applying for a World Cup. Qatar therefore founded a national team in 2009. The first game was lost 0:17 against Bahrain in October 2010. In December 2010, Qatar was awarded the 2022 World Cup.
The Qatari women then played a few more games and even took part in the West Asian Championship in April 2014 under German coach Monika Staab. Since the tournament, not a single game has been played. After all: There is a women’s league. However, the games will not be broadcast on television because of the moral watchdog. Men are also usually not allowed in the audience.
Workers’ Fund: “Shameful”
How many construction workers died during the construction of World Cup buildings is controversial. FIFA and Qatar speak of a maximum of 40 deaths on the construction sites, human rights organizations of several thousand in the wider World Cup context. In 2024, Qatar and FIFA launched the “Legacy Fund”, which includes $50 million. The money goes to global projects for education and refugees.
Corruption expert Sylvia Schenk says: “It was controversial between the NGOs (non-governmental organizations; editor’s note) whether a lot of effort was being made to locate those who were injured ten or more years ago in their home countries, or whether current and future workers should be better protected and supported.”
Amnesty International criticizes that the fund was launched too late and with too little money. In addition, affected construction workers or their families would not be compensated. For the human rights organization, FIFA’s behavior is “shameful”.
Climate neutrality: clear verdict
One of FIFA and Qatar’s biggest promises was to make the World Cup completely climate-neutral. Experts and environmental organizations have long doubted the claim. And courts in Switzerland and Germany have now ruled that FIFA can no longer claim that the tournament was carried out in a completely climate-neutral manner.
The ruling of the Berlin II Regional Court from mid-November 2025 states: “The increased need for information regarding the accuracy, clarity and unambiguity of the advertising message was not sufficiently met in this case.”
What do politicians say about this?
The Parliamentary State Secretary and former spokesman for human rights Michael Brand (52/CDU) told “Bild”: “This lie and deception surprises few people – Fifa is not about sport, but only about commerce. I still remember well how the DFB glossed over things in advance, at hearings in the Bundestag, when there were critical questions, and didn’t want to see it.”
The interview was created for the Sports Competence Center (WELT, “Bild”, “Sport Bild”) and first published in “Bild am Sonntag”.
