The 2022 Qatar World Cup is doomed to be written into history, because a team that could have advanced to the final round was directly disqualified and expelled from the World Cup, that is, Russia.
The news that Russia has been banned from the world by FIFA caused an uproar. Russia's play-off rivals, Poland, will benefit from this and will most likely advance directly to the final of this group, competing with the winners of Sweden and the Czech Republic for the only qualifying place in this group.
FIFA originally thought that the next World Preliminary Round would be unimpeded, but unexpectedly, trouble came again!
On the evening of March 1, Beijing time, in an interview with the media, Francesco Barranka, chairman of the Ethics Committee of the Ukrainian Football Association, revealed that the World Cup qualifiers held at the end of March in the European zone play-offs Scotland and Ukraine are likely to be unable to be carried out.
In the group stage of the World Cup European Qualifiers, Ukraine and France, Finland, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kazakhstan are in the same group, 8 group matches, Ukraine although unbeaten, but also only won 2.
In the end, Ukraine finished second in the group with 2 wins and 6 draws (just 1 point ahead of Finland) and qualified for the play-offs.
Barranka revealed that according to the current situation, it is completely unimaginable and impossible to let the Ukrainian national team participate in the play-offs of the World Preliminary Round as originally planned, whether physically or psychologically, Ukrainian players have no way to prepare.
Not only that, in the current situation, how to assemble a complete Ukrainian national team has become a problem, let alone a competition.
What should FIFA do if the Ukrainian national team cannot assemble and compete? There are very few options left for FIFA, one option is to abstain from Ukraine, announcing that the opponent Scotland will advance directly to the final of the play-offs, if such a decision is made, what will FIFA face?
Another option is to postpone the match, this way of dealing with it is not very realistic, first of all, when will the Ukrainian national team be able to participate in the game, it is completely unknown, the other group of this group ended early, waiting for all unknown Ukraine?
Francesco Barranca gave her own advice on the possible challenges that FIFA may face: "FIFA can directly qualify the Ukrainian national team for the Qatar World Cup! ”
Barranka said frankly: "When I said this, my emotions were indeed a little excited, and I also knew that there was no basis in terms of rules for ukraine to pass the World Cup, but what I wanted to say was that if Ukraine directly qualified, it would give the Ukrainian people strong energy and bring them great encouragement." Because football can play an important role in tragedy. ”
So far, FIFA has not responded to a proposal from Ukraine to directly qualify for the World Cup. The World Cup became 33 teams participating, which doesn't sound realistic.