Sending the World Cup to Saudi Arabia was the most seismic sporting announcement in a decade, but at Fifa HQ it was designed to seem like just an ordinary Wednesday. Behind firmly-closed doors, Gianni Infantino kicked off his 3pm work-from-home-style Zoom meeting presenting not to the great and good of football,

FIFA named the hosts for the 2030 and 2034 World Cups on Wednesday with Spain, Portugal and Morocco getting the former edition and Saudi Arabia controversially landing the latter. There is minimal surprise at the outcome given that the two decisions have been considered a foregone conclusion since there was only one single candidate for each event.

Saudi Arabia has been officially confirmed by FIFA as host of the 2034 World Cup in men’s soccer. The Saudi bid was the only candidate and was acclaimed by the applause of more than 200 FIFA member federations.