By Nick Harris 18 May 2015 International workers’ unions have today joined forces with pressure groups seeking reform of football’s world governing body Fifa to demand that Fifa’s sponsors accept their corporate responsibility and challenge human rights abuses at World Cup 2022 infrastructure construction sites in Qatar. The move comes as reports are published about BBC journalists being arrested while trying […]

By Nick Harris 17 November 2013 A new report published this evening by Amnesty International and based on interviews with workers, employers and government officials, says that Qatar’s construction sector is “rife with abuse, with workers employed on multi-million dollar projects suffering serious exploitation.” Amnesty say that the full 166-page report – The Dark Side of Migration: […]

By Nick Harris SJA Internet Sports Writer of the Year                                             25 March 2013 The story of Robert Beal, also known as “The man who hoaxed The Times,” might be amusing if it did not […]

By Nick Harris SJA Internet Sports Writer of the Year 12 March 2013 The American lawyer investigating the circumstances in which the 2022 World Cup was awarded to Qatar has urged anyone with information that could prove wrongdoing in the bidding process to share that information as soon as possible. Michael Garcia is a former […]

By Nick Harris 7 January 2011 As Fifa’s president Sepp Blatter said today that he expects the 2022 World Cup in Qatar to be staged in winter for the safety of the players, Qatar’s 2022 bid website was unavailable, therefore couldn’t remind the world of the promises Qatar made of cooling technologies to allow a […]

By Nick Harris 6 December 2010 An anti-homophobia group that campaigns for equality in football has criticised the decision of Fifa’s executive committee to award the 2022 World Cup to Qatar, a nation where homosexuality is a crime that can carry a five-year prison term. That sanction is not theoretical – Qatar has had cases […]

By Pete Wilson 2 December 2010 Russia won the right to stage the 2018 World Cup today after a Fifa Executive Committee vote sent England crashing out in the first round. Qatar then landed the right to host the 2022 event after four rounds of voting, having led every round. The result means Fifa will […]

16 November 2010 It’s already being called the worst miss in football history. It’s certainly a blooper. Qatar’s teenage striker Fahad Khalfan really should have scored this one (see video below) against Uzbekistan to put the Asian Games holders into the quarter-finals yesterday, but hit the post rather than tap into an open goal. Uzbekistan […]

By Pete Wilson 29 April 2010 Qatar’s bid for the 2022 World Cup will rest on no traditional footie bedrocks: it cannot lay claim to a deep footballing culture or heritage; the nation is frankly too hot and uncomfortable in its natural state to stage the event to the satisfaction of the competing sides; and […]

By Nick Harris 25 July 2016 The International Olympic Committee (IOC) was aware Russia ran a state-sponsored doping programme in which the head of that nation’s WADA-accredited lab was a central figure as long ago as the first week of July 2013. I know this because I told them. I told them on the phone […]