Qatar could be the best or the worst World Cup

When I first heard that Qatar has won the 2022 World Cup, I admit I thought it was all over. The World Cup as a magical, beautiful and uniting event was, in 2022, to be run through the mud of vested interests, corrupt decision-making and the special insanity of money over morals.

I still feel that to some extent.

But this article gives me hope. It is true that the first Arab World Cup may indeed be a means not only to promote Arab culture in general but can unite the Arab world and allow it to rise to the potential it offered during Europe's Dark Ages, when it effectively ruled the world in cultural sophistication.

We can only hope the organisers and FIFA move the event in such a direction.

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Post-UNOSDP - Is the IOC fool's gold?

This is a longer version of an article published on SportandDev.org With the United Nations Office on Sport for Development and Peace closed down by the global body, there is undoubtedly a void in this space in which many of us here work. But, for all the high profile oomph the UNOSDP added to the world of sport for good, it’s passing need not be seen as devastating. For one, the work the UNOSDP has already done in its 16 years of life has laid a platform for the development of sport for social justice. While many of us knew for years that sport had a wider purpose beyond mere business or entertainment, the UNOSDP has provided a base of credibility that may have otherwise taken much longer to establish. While much of the work is, in many ways, still to be done, the UNOSDP has left a positive legacy on which we can all build. More problematic is the shifting of the UNOSDP’s brief to the IOC. Obliging the IOC to administer to the peace and development facets ...

Statement on Funding for the Rohingya Football Club

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