Is football a cannibal eating other sports?
At the restaurant on the ground floor of the Stanglwirt Hotel in the Austrian town of Kitzbühel, a sports summit was held on Sept. 1. The top people included Joseph Sepp Blatter, Nawal el-Moutawakel, Dr. Thomas Bach, Franz Beckenbauer, Gianni Infantino, Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, Marcus Höfl and several heads of numerous sports federations...
A foundation named after the legendary footballer Franz Beckenbauer has been organizing an event named “Camp Beckenbauer” for the last two years. For two days, famous and influential people from the world of sport get together to discuss its future.
This year’s most popular topics are football and the Olympics. Football is developing at such an immense rate that everybody is asking: “Will football wipe out all other sports?”
UEFA Secretary General Gianni Infantino has said they will try to establish a “League of Nations” as of 2016, though several federations are opposed to the idea. They say this will be too much of a burden on the players. In response, Infantino insists that this league will not increase the number of matches a player plays annually.
If I have understood correctly, they want to make a league out of the friendly preparatory games European teams play before the world and European championship games. They aim to boost interest in matches and create an economy in this way.
The summit also discussed a project that would see European matches start at 6 p.m.
In addition, the head of the Olympic Committee, Dr. Thomas Bach, said they had signed an agreement with the International Criminal Police Organization (INTERPOL) on sports crimes. Of course, doping and match-fixing top the list of sports crimes.
A political question: What will happen to Qatar and Russia?
Meanwhile, the hottest topic at the camp was “politics, corruption and football.” Of course, everybody had the question in their minds on whether or not the 2022 World Football Championships would be held in Qatar. The second question was whether or not the 2018 World Football Championship would be held in Russia because of the current crises in Ukraine.
The only thing they could do in Qatar is move the championship from the summer to the winter months.
The population of the world football family is 1.2 billion people. Blatter gave us these figures: There are 209 federations in the world and 300 million people who play football. The population of people who play football with their families is around 1.2 billion people.
Is financial fair play possible in football?
One of the most important issues at Camp Beckenbauer was “financial fair play.” It has started to become a serious problem that top football clubs in Europe, such as Real Madrid, Barcelona, Manchester United, Chelsea and Arsenal pay astronomical amounts of money to star players that other clubs cannot afford.
There are two dimensions to the problem. On the one hand, major advantages are provided for strong clubs, causing unfair competition. On the other hand, the financial balances of other clubs that are trying to cope with this are hugely disrupted. As a result, several clubs are on the brink of bankruptcy.