If FIFA were only concerned about profits, the World Cup would have never gone to South Africa. That doesn't mean FIFA is profit agnostic, but their real motivations lie somewhere in between, giving us room to debate the significance of one consultancy's findings that England and the United States' World Cup bids would be the most profitable from the 2018 and 2022 candidacies.
Consultancy Tells FIFA That England, United States World Cup Bids Would Be Most Profitable
According to Reuters (as distributed here by the Guardian), those were the conclusions produced in a confidential report compiled for FIFA by the McKinsey, management consultancy firm. The report judged each bid in terms of its ability to meet FIFA's undisclosed revenue goals. For 2018, England received a 100 percent rating, indicative of their ability to meet each revenue goal across the study's five profit streams. The Spain/Portugal bid received a rating of 91 percent, while Holland/Belgium measured at 87 percent. Russia was just behind with 86 percent.
Amongst the 2022 bids, only one exceeds 2018's worst evaluation. The United States' bid, like England's, was given a 100 percent rating, outdistancing Japan's rating of 73 percent. South Korea was next (71) followed by Qatar (70) and Australia (68).
For people who back either England's bid or the United States' package, this will be a feather in the cap, though it's unclear what this study really means. If profitability is a motive for FIFA, it certainly is not the only one, having awarded successive World Cups of South Africa and Brazil.
But certainly this can’t hurt. While people may too readily paint everybody in FIFA as money sniffing hounds, I doubt there are any executive committee members who will see McKinsey’s findings and say “Ooh, that’s too much money.”
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