{"id":297791,"date":"2023-05-17T20:42:37","date_gmt":"2023-05-17T20:42:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=297791"},"modified":"2023-05-18T00:00:01","modified_gmt":"2023-05-18T00:00:01","slug":"shock-nation-puts-hand-up-to-host-world-cup","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=297791","title":{"rendered":"Shock nation puts hand up to host World Cup"},"content":{"rendered":"

Qatar's<\/a> push to become a central hub on the global sporting landscape could see the emirate be an unlikely host of a Rugby League World Cup<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Qatar is one of four nations to express an interest in staging the 2025 tournament, rugby league's governing body said, after France withdrew its hosting rights<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have received expressions of interest from New Zealand, Fiji, South Africa and Qatar already," said Troy Grant, chairman of the International Rugby League.<\/p>\n

READ MORE: <\/strong>Gould prediction that foresaw brewing Dragons mess\ufeff<\/strong><\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/strong> Eddie's grim warning to Tasmania over protests<\/strong><\/a>\ufeff<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/p>\n

READ MORE: \ufeff<\/strong>Floods cause cancellation of Italian Grand Prix<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cWe are yet to make any assessments in regarded to their viability, I\u2019m just being honest about who has reached out. It gives me comfort that there is interest in our sport and our World Cup. How real or viable any or all of those options are, we\u2019re yet to make any of those assessments.\u201d<\/p>\n

Qatar does not have a team or a world ranking in rugby league and has never played an international match.<\/p>\n

The small Persian Gulf country is coming off hosting the men's soccer World Cup for the first time last year while soccer's Asian Cup will be held there in January and the men's basketball World Cup in 2027. Doha will host the multi-sport Asian Games in 2030 and Qatar is widely expected to launch another campaign to host an Olympics in 2036.<\/p>\n

Previously, Qatar staged cycling's road worlds in 2016 and the world track championship in 2019 \u2014 and struggled to attract crowds for both.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Grant said the Qatari interest in the Rugby League World Cup comprises two approaches combining state and public funding.<\/p>\n

French organisers said they couldn\u2019t fully meet financial guarantees for the risk of loss demanded by the French government and the IRL is scrambling to save the tournament, which could be delayed or scrapped completely.<\/p>\n

The current format sees the men\u2019s, women\u2019s and wheelchair tournaments take place at the same time and in the same host country, which \u2014 for Grant \u2014 is a \u201cmassive selling point".<\/p>\n

\u201cSo to abandon that strategy would be disappointing but we have to be practical in any decisions we make going forward,\u201d he said. \u201cIt gets us to rethink how we do everything going forward. There\u2019s a unique opportunity that this adversity presents, and I think we should take that opportunity.\u201d<\/p>\n

Grant said the IRL needed to move quickly.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt will certainly have a big bearing on where the tournament is in 2025, if it proceeds," he said. \u201cThere is a potential option to move out of this cycle and create a new cycle, and that will also be a discussion point for the board in June and July. We are not wedded to anything, to be honest."<\/p>\n

For a daily dose of the best of the breaking news and exclusive content from Wide World of Sports, subscribe to our newsletter by<\/strong> clicking here<\/strong><\/a>!<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Qatar's push to become a central hub on the global sporting landscape could see the emirate be an unlikely host of a Rugby League World […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":297793,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/297791"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=297791"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/297791\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":297794,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/297791\/revisions\/297794"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/297793"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=297791"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=297791"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=297791"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}