ZURICH: Bid teams seeking votes to host the World Cup in 2018 and 2022 will not be allowed to mount expensive lobbying campaigns, FIFA president Sepp Blatter said Friday.
Blatter said he wanted to control costs for the 11 official candidates. They are: Australia, England, Indonesia, Japan, Mexico, Qatar, Russia, South Korea and United States, plus joint bids from Belgium-Netherlands and Spain-Portugal.
Qatar and South Korea have applied only for the 2022 finals, while the other nine candidates are in both races.
FIFA s 24 executive committee members will select the two winning bids in December 2010 – and don t want to be assaulted at tournaments and official meetings by lavishly mounted exhibitions advertising potential hosts.
There shall be no exhibitions of the candidature until the (2010) Congress in South Africa, Blatter said after an executive committee meeting.
Bid teams can have three accredited people attend the FIFA Congress being held May 31-June 3 in the Bahamas, and three tournaments being played in Africa this year – the Confederations Cup in South Africa, the under-20 World Cup in Egypt and the under-17 World Cup in Nigeria.
They can work but we don t want an exhibition, Blatter said. It is time-wasting and very expensive.
The FIFA president said the executive committee did not formally discuss the World Cup bidding contests just four days after the candidates were formally declared.
However, Blatter spoke warmly of the prospects for the CONCACAF region, home to Mexico and the US.
The last time the World Cup has been in CONCACAF was in 1994. So it was a long time ago, Blatter said. All possibilities are offered.
