Colombia offers proof that Fifa is prepared to rip it up and start again when
it comes to staging a World Cup.
Yet the decision to hand Mexico the tournament as late replacements proved as
contentious and divisive as the current stand-off which threatens to leave
2022 up for grabs again.
Colombia's initial success in securing the right to host the 1986 World Cup
was due to the country's president, Misael Pastrana Borrero, aggressively
lobbying Fifa for the right to claim a tournament which had already been
staged in Uruguay, Brazil, Chile and Argentina.
Borrero regarded Colombia, South America's second-most populous nation, as
being next in line to host the tournament and it was also central to his
political ambitions - an opportunity to justify wide scale spending on grand
projects including sporting arenas.
Sir Stanley Rous, Fifa's English president, sanctioned the awarding of the
tournament to Colombia, but the subsequent collapse of the country's economy
and emergence of the M-19 guerrilla movement in the late-1970s prompted
widespread concerns over Colombia's ability to host the World Cup.
But after bowing to political pressure, Colombian president Belisario Betancur
pulled the plug on the World Cup in a statement in October 1982.
"I announce to my compatriots that the 1986 World Football championship will
not be held in Colombia," Betancur said. "We have a lot of things to do here
and there is not enough time to attend to the extravagances of Fifa and its
members."
Some stadia, including Barranquila's Estadio Metropolitano Roberto Melendez -
now the home of Colombia's national team - were already on the way to being
built for the tournament, but the country was on the brink of a bloody drug
war and Betancur's withdrawal spared Fifa a potentially disastrous
competition in 1986.
Handing the tournament to Mexico was hardly straightforward, however, with
Fifa politicking prompting the former American Secretary of State, Henry
Kissinger, to claim that Fifa politics were 'dirtier than world politics'.
The United States, Canada, Brazil and Mexico all offered themselves as late
replacements for Colombia, but the race was ultimately between the Americans
and Mexicans, who had hosted the tournament as recently as 1970.
The Americans, backed by Pele and Franz Beckenbauer, appeared to have the most
influential support, but Fifa president Joao Havelange, apparently angered
by the North American Soccer League's refusal to abandon gimmicks such as
penalty shoot-outs for drawn games and a 35-yard offside line, pushed for
Mexico.
Fifa and Havelange were also made aware of a potential South American boycott
of the tournament should it be handed to the United States - a nation
regarded as hostile to many in Latin America.
But ultimately, it came down to money and the opportunity for Fifa to make
substantial financial gains by turning to Mexico.
Guillermo Caneda, the head of Mexican media giant Televisa, held the powerful
position of Fifa vice-president and he was able to persuade Havelange and
his fellow powerbrokers that his commercial blueprint - including the
inflated sale of television rights to European broadcasters - would
transform Fifa's finances.
Mexico's staging of the tournament just 16 years prior to 1986 was
conveniently overlooked in favour of handing the World Cup back to the
Mexicans.
The United States went on to rebuild their relationship with Fifa, hosting the
tournament in 1994, while Colombia are now considering a bid for the 2026
competition, despite the likelihood of Argentina and Uruguay co-hosting a
centenary World Cup four years later.
Whether Qatar will go the same way as Colombia remains to be seen, but the
1986 tournament suggests that the politics have only just begun.