Qatar World Cup game of three halves would be ad boost for TV and Fifa
Fifa has denied reports that World Cup games in Qatar could be over three half-hour periods because of the heat, but you can't help noticing that more ad breaks would result
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Matt Scott
Matt Scott
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 7 July 2011 14.09 BST
Article history
Ummslal stadium in Qatar
Ummslal stadium in Qatar, hosts of the 2022 World Cup, where matches could be played over three 30 minute sessions because of the heat. Photograph: HH Vision
When the 2022 World Cup was awarded to Qatar some things were always going to warp under the desert sun. But few could have predicted that it would be the very structure of the game of football itself that changes shape.
Yet that is precisely what could happen when the football world makes its desert trek in a decade's time, according to a director of the firm whose technology will be used to keep the stadiums cool. Michael Beaven of the engineers Arup Associates told a conference on Wednesday of the "extreme risk" of injury to players if stadium temperatures rise beyond 30C. "If it's 32C [Fifa says it] will stop a match and play three 30-minute thirds rather than two 45-minute halves," said Beaven. At midday on Thursday the mercury in Doha climbed to 38C, with 41C forecast for Friday, and both dates could very well be used as World Cup match days in 2022.
The three-thirds idea would be some departure from tradition if it comes to pass. Football has been played in two sets of 45 minutes since its earliest Victorian origins almost 150 years ago. During that time two World Cups have taken place in Mexico, and another in the US, when the Republic of Ireland played Holland in Orlando on Independence Day.
As the Republic's former midfielder Ray Houghton told the BBC last year the heat at that 1994 tournament was dangerously oppressive. "The heat was a massive factor," Houghton recalled. "When we played Mexico in Orlando it was about 110 degrees [Fahrenheit, or 43C] and there were problems getting water to us on the pitch. I got booked for picking up a bag of water that had been lobbed at me, which was ridiculous given the conditions."
Fifa has denied that the three-thirds rather than two-halves structure of a 90-minute football match is under formal consideration but it is clear it has shifted its focus and is scratching around for ways to take the heat off players.
The ideas flowing from Fifa's thinktanks are stimulated by fears that there is much more at stake today than 17 years ago. Back in 1994 the world-record transfer fee was about £10m, today it is £80m, and fees in excess of £20m are routinely paid for proven international players. Fifa's liability if negligence led to tragedy would be dangerously high.
And so there has been urgency in Fifa's thinking. It took only one month after the controversial decision to hand Qatar the World Cup for Fifa's president, Sepp Blatter, to propose his first solution. It was for the World Cup to be held in the Arabian winter but this scheme was swiftly quashed as the clubs rose up in revolt. It is one thing releasing their players for a tournament to be played in risky conditions while receiving negligible financial return – $100,000 (£63,000) per club on average, from a tournament generating $3.7bn for Fifa – quite another for the World Cup tournament also to be plonked in the middle of their season schedule.
It was a battle Blatter could not win because ranged against him were not only the clubs but the broadcasters, whose winter-summer cycle of domestic-and-international football is extremely lucrative. Beaven says that the idea of a game of three thirds "would play havoc with TV schedules and those kind of things" but here his thinking seems misplaced.
An extra playing period introduces an extra interval, and an extra interval provides commercial broadcasters with more ad space to sell. And when the World Cup becomes more lucrative for commercial broadcasters, it becomes more lucrative for Fifa.
The 2010 World Cup broadcasting rights were worth $2.4bn to Fifa; for that to grow considerably in future there would have to be some radical developments.
Fifa's marketers will not be blind to the $3m that was paid for 30 seconds of US advertising airtime during the 2009 Super Bowl, nor to the fact that the four-quarters structure of American football yielded 48 minutes of commercials.
A desire to tap in to that kind of lucre has surely motivated the three-thirds considerations as much as any deeply felt concern for players' health. After all, 17 years ago, Ray Houghton was getting booked by Fifa's referees just for trying to slake his thirst.
Fifa has denied reports that World Cup games in Qatar could be over three half-hour periods because of the heat, but you can't help noticing that more ad breaks would result
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Comments (148)
Matt Scott
Matt Scott
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 7 July 2011 14.09 BST
Article history
Ummslal stadium in Qatar
Ummslal stadium in Qatar, hosts of the 2022 World Cup, where matches could be played over three 30 minute sessions because of the heat. Photograph: HH Vision
When the 2022 World Cup was awarded to Qatar some things were always going to warp under the desert sun. But few could have predicted that it would be the very structure of the game of football itself that changes shape.
Yet that is precisely what could happen when the football world makes its desert trek in a decade's time, according to a director of the firm whose technology will be used to keep the stadiums cool. Michael Beaven of the engineers Arup Associates told a conference on Wednesday of the "extreme risk" of injury to players if stadium temperatures rise beyond 30C. "If it's 32C [Fifa says it] will stop a match and play three 30-minute thirds rather than two 45-minute halves," said Beaven. At midday on Thursday the mercury in Doha climbed to 38C, with 41C forecast for Friday, and both dates could very well be used as World Cup match days in 2022.
The three-thirds idea would be some departure from tradition if it comes to pass. Football has been played in two sets of 45 minutes since its earliest Victorian origins almost 150 years ago. During that time two World Cups have taken place in Mexico, and another in the US, when the Republic of Ireland played Holland in Orlando on Independence Day.
As the Republic's former midfielder Ray Houghton told the BBC last year the heat at that 1994 tournament was dangerously oppressive. "The heat was a massive factor," Houghton recalled. "When we played Mexico in Orlando it was about 110 degrees [Fahrenheit, or 43C] and there were problems getting water to us on the pitch. I got booked for picking up a bag of water that had been lobbed at me, which was ridiculous given the conditions."
Fifa has denied that the three-thirds rather than two-halves structure of a 90-minute football match is under formal consideration but it is clear it has shifted its focus and is scratching around for ways to take the heat off players.
The ideas flowing from Fifa's thinktanks are stimulated by fears that there is much more at stake today than 17 years ago. Back in 1994 the world-record transfer fee was about £10m, today it is £80m, and fees in excess of £20m are routinely paid for proven international players. Fifa's liability if negligence led to tragedy would be dangerously high.
And so there has been urgency in Fifa's thinking. It took only one month after the controversial decision to hand Qatar the World Cup for Fifa's president, Sepp Blatter, to propose his first solution. It was for the World Cup to be held in the Arabian winter but this scheme was swiftly quashed as the clubs rose up in revolt. It is one thing releasing their players for a tournament to be played in risky conditions while receiving negligible financial return – $100,000 (£63,000) per club on average, from a tournament generating $3.7bn for Fifa – quite another for the World Cup tournament also to be plonked in the middle of their season schedule.
It was a battle Blatter could not win because ranged against him were not only the clubs but the broadcasters, whose winter-summer cycle of domestic-and-international football is extremely lucrative. Beaven says that the idea of a game of three thirds "would play havoc with TV schedules and those kind of things" but here his thinking seems misplaced.
An extra playing period introduces an extra interval, and an extra interval provides commercial broadcasters with more ad space to sell. And when the World Cup becomes more lucrative for commercial broadcasters, it becomes more lucrative for Fifa.
The 2010 World Cup broadcasting rights were worth $2.4bn to Fifa; for that to grow considerably in future there would have to be some radical developments.
Fifa's marketers will not be blind to the $3m that was paid for 30 seconds of US advertising airtime during the 2009 Super Bowl, nor to the fact that the four-quarters structure of American football yielded 48 minutes of commercials.
A desire to tap in to that kind of lucre has surely motivated the three-thirds considerations as much as any deeply felt concern for players' health. After all, 17 years ago, Ray Houghton was getting booked by Fifa's referees just for trying to slake his thirst.
Not only is it nonsense and attempting to change the basics of football, but even 30 minute thirds wouldnt exactly negate the heat.
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