Cards on the table, I’ve screwed the pooch on this one. The FIFA World Cup is a great spectacle, regardless of whether you’re a; die-hard footy fan who religiously follows your local league 2 team, premiership team and even a LaLiga team or someone who has practically no interest in the game.
The fact the FIFA World Cup will play out in Qatar is great. Yes, many people say that Qatar bribed FIFA and that there are a lot of humanitarian rights issues going on, I’m not here to give my views on that. I’m also not here to give my views on whether it’s right for it to have been moved to Winter instead of Summer. I will say having experienced Doha in the summer there isn’t a cat in hells chance you’d catch me leaving the swimming pool, never mind travelling with tens of thousands of fans to be packed into stadiums.
My assumption based on previous experiences is that the biggest issue I would face would be sorting flights out. That was simple thanks to Qatar Airways. 86,000 Avios and £340 got me a return from Edinburgh to Doha in business class.
This is a print screen of Google Hotels showing a 5-night stay next month in Doha, Qatar. Notice there are 230 hotels and each lists a price per night, also notice on the minimap that where the hotels are it displays prices.
This is what it looks like for 5 nights in December. All 230 hotels are fully booked. Not one hotel taking any bookings and this is the same for any date throughout the FIFA World Cup. There are rumours that FIFA has either bought out or stipulated that they will control all hotels in Qatar during the World Cup.
Granted we are more than 6 months out from the start of the tournament but currently, i have royally screwed this up. This got me searching on Airbnb…
If all else fails, pay someone £153 a night to camp in their back garden? Hopefully, things improve and hotels bookings are released.