By GRAHAM DUNBAR – AP Sports Editor
GENEVA (AP) — There has been a World Cup match schedule like this.
The first World Cup in November and December, in the heat of the Qatari desert, is just the starting point for other exclusive features.
For Qatari players and fans, as well as audiences around the world, matches are played early and on a more intense schedule than at any previous stage of the organization. Four separate start time slots are required for this tournament to work, although they were used on the first Saturday of past tournaments.
In Qatar, there will be back-to-back games for seven consecutive days for this World Cup just 29 days away.
This is 3 days less in total than those used to play the 2018 tournament in Russia and the 2014 edition in Brazil.
A 32-day tournament with five full weekends was unavailable this time due to the deal FIFA had to reach with European leagues and clubs in 2015 to bring down the World Cup in the middle of its domestic season.
The organization of the European Leagues had warned of “very serious damage” to the monetary and economic interests of its members by closing them for at least six weeks.
While mythical clubs and stars like Erling Haaland take an extended break or head to camp, World Cup players have intense time ahead of them.
Teams in Groups G and H, such as Brazil and Portugal, have as few rest days as possible. To win the title, they will need to play seven matches in just 25 days. The World Cup doesn’t even prevent between organization level and elimination levels.
“It will be a very exhausting tournament and it is true that we started later,” Portugal coach Fernando Santos said after the April 1 draw.
“The merit I see is that it starts on the 24th,” he said, noting that the groups that will play on Nov. 21 — England, the Netherlands, the United States — have fewer days to prepare.
Santos, who needs the extra days before the tournament to train, highlighted the dilemma facing the maximum of 32 coaches in a World Cup where 75% of the players selected are contracted through European clubs.
European national leagues basically played matches until the last day on Sunday before FIFA ordered players to be part of their national teams.
That leaves just one week of official preparation at least two weeks before a general World Cup.
In Sunday’s Premier League, Ecuadorian players Moisés Caicedo and Pervis Estupiñán were on the Brighton pitch just a week before their team opened the World Cup against Qatar.
When the clock ticked in Doha on Monday, the Nov. 14 deadline set by FIFA for players to be in the national team, team members from Argentina, Brazil, France, Poland and Serbia were still on the field in Italy, where Juventus’ Lazio. The adjustment ended around 11 p. m. local time.
“We don’t have time to prepare the team, only seven days,” Croatian coach Zlatko Dalić said in April. “It probably wouldn’t be easy for us. “
There was no better solution when FIFA showed the inevitable change of dates in 2015, accepting that the World Cup will not be played or hosted in June, when temperatures in Qatar exceed forty-five degrees Celsius (113 degrees Fahrenheit).
Seven years ago, the European option of a tournament in January 2022 was rejected by FIFA officials at the time due to a direct clash with the Beijing Winter Olympics.
“Of course it’s an ideal scenario to play in November and December,” Gianni Infantino, then UEFA general secretary (now FIFA president), said in March 2015, “and we would have liked to play in January because it would have had less impact.
However, the agreement to play in November and December created a five-month delay that was demonstrated when the COVID-19 pandemic wreaked havoc on foreign football. Almost all World Cup qualifiers scheduled for 2020 were postponed.
When it came time to finalize the World Cup dates, a red line to make sure the Premier League had its classic matches on December 26.
The solution satisfied for Qatar to hold a four-week tournament with a classic and auspicious Sunday final: the emirate’s national day on December 18.
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AP World Cup coverage: https://apnews. com/hub/world-cup and https://twitter. com/AP_Sports
By GRAHAM DUNBAR
AP Sports Writer
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