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    #26
    And by the way, Kev, thank you for that informative input.
    Regardless of what you think about Trump, Mexico or Canada. They're still elected, the people there. Not on thrones.

    Comment


      #27
      Why isn't China ever bidding for this stuff. Don't they have loads of stadiums?

      Comment


        #28
        Originally posted by antoine polus View Post
        Why isn't China ever bidding for this stuff. Don't they have loads of stadiums?
        Good question. Football is surprisingly not that popular there, I guess. It seems they prefer basketball.

        Comment


          #29
          It’s worth remembering that Minneapolis, Chicago, and Vancouver* all voluntarily pulled out of the running to host matches in 2026, citing a lack of transparency by FIFA and cost uncertainty. Or maybe it was cost-certainty, as in, it would certainly cost too much.

          That shows that even after all the scandal and talk of reform that FIFA still thinks they can shake down hosts. And it shows that at least some cities are willing to tell them to fuck off. That’s a good sign.



          *Minnesotans are definitely not in a welcoming mood following the Super Bowl, which totally fucked up downtown Minneapolis for weeks for little benefit to the city as a whole. And Chicago and Vancouver rightly figured out that the World Cup needs them more than they need the World Cup. Also, iirc, BC place would need some work to be suitable for a WC. Soldier Field is, I think, ready as is. But Chicago and Vancouver don’t need any more publicity and I don’t thin they’re starving for big events to fill hotels.

          Comment


            #30
            Originally posted by Limey View Post
            I don't see empty seats being too much of an issue if the World Cup is held in the U.S. Due to MLS, there are currently 15 "soccer-specific" stadiums dotted around the country, with more being built, and each has a capacity of between 18,000 and 26,000. So, I'd imagine that a game like Uganda vs Bolivia (for example) would be at a venue like Red Bull Arena (25,000 capacity) rather than Giants Stadium (80,000).
            But FIFA's rules require matches to be held in stadia with capacities of 40,000 or more. If they were willing to use smaller grounds for some matches then yes, that could work, but they've not made any noises along those lines.

            Originally posted by Kev7 View Post
            I don’t have time to develop now but if anyone is interested, just give us a shout and I'll develop a little more on this but basically don’t be fooled by welcoming Morocco, the tourism, the friendly open image, the "modernist" King Mohammed VI (the current ruler) etc. Morocco is a proper "modern" dictatorship, or at the very least a very strong autocracy, run with an iron fist by a Mohammed VI, a narcissistic despot but one with a modern twist, extremely corrupt too but that goes without saying, the Moroccan royal family is worth billions, they have their fingers in every pie there is to be had.
            I thought the sensible default position to hold was that if a place is bidding to host either the men's football World Cup or the Olympic Games, there are probably some pretty dodgy reasons they shouldn't be allowed it. This applies far more to the World Cup, of course.

            Originally posted by antoine polus View Post
            Why isn't China ever bidding for this stuff. Don't they have loads of stadiums?
            My guess would be that they're aiming to get their national team up to a standard where they won't be completely humiliated in every group stage game first. Plus of course Asia is excluded from bidding for the next few due to Qatar hosting (for now) in 2022. I wouldn't be at all surprised to see China bid for 2034 or 2038.

            Comment


              #31
              Originally posted by Pietro Paolo Virdis View Post
              And by the way, Kev, thank you for that informative input.
              No bother, happy to help. It's not a country that's often in the UK media radar, hence my intervention as a few Ofters on here weren't too sure what sort of regime it really is in practice (it's true that when you go there on a holiday, you don't necessarily realise what goes on, a bit like when I used to go to Spain under Franco, it did fool a lot of people into thinking that, well, it was a democracy of sorts after all).

              Comment


                #32
                Originally posted by linus View Post
                Bottom line - Morocco is a glorified Franco-American colony, and its ruler, like that of all other monarchies in the Arab world, is pretty much a puppet. Kevin's long narrative about the Moroccan dynasty obscures this basic fact.

                Morocco has benefitted from a modicum of economic and social stability due in part to its geographical location; political stability by virtue of being located very far away from Israel, and economic stability as a low-cost labor center close to the EU.

                Morocco is too small and too poor to support a vanity project like the World Cup, unlike the Gulf kingdoms. a joint Maghreb bid on the other hand involving Algeria and Tunisia would be a lot more feasible.
                Nice to see you back here linus.

                "Kevin's long narrative about the Moroccan dynasty obscures this basic fact.", hmm Interesting, interesting viewpoint from you here. Lovely to see you back in such pernickety, polemic form.

                Welcome back anyway, we need people like you on OFT, it can feel a bit boring and samey at times, it’s all a bit "pensée unique" (orthodoxy) as Éric Zemmour or Peterson would say of us lefties, or even bloody Jean-François Khan for that matter, well, he coined the pensée unique phrase after all and he is a leftie or sort of. I like Khan, I’ve always liked his mags but I’m digressing here.
                I do mean my welcome back bit BTW, I like to read your posts on climate changes as I know very little about it and I like to hear contrary views on that topic, it informs the debate and for lay people like myself it has value even if I don’t generally agree with you on that topic, it’s still interesting to read you on it, you seem to know the topic well (do you work in the environment sector?). I quite like that thread but I don’t feel qualified enough really to stick my oar in, I’d only be repeating the standard stuff I’ve heard somewhere else so wouldn't add much to the debate.

                However, I’m not terribly enchanted with your little pique here my dear linus, you’ve been a bit of a badden, again! You come on here after skiving and going awol for months, you barge in and first thing you do, you disrupt the lesson with some baseless and inconsiderate dig at my post. That is not on at all, not on. Trêve de plaisanterie... Seriously, you’re overstretching the point here, you’re going too far in your short-but-pithy criticism of my post "long narrative obscuring this basic [puppet] fact".

                Oh, and also: you are, IMHO, very wrong in your last bit ("a joint Maghreb bid on the other hand involving Algeria and Tunisia would be a lot more feasible"). It is a lovely idea on paper but it really totally unfeasible. You roughly know the situation between Morocco and Algeria, don’t you? I would imagine from your post that you are aware of the geopolitical situation and stuff between them. And you do know the overall situation in Algeria itself too I presume? Then, if you do know all that, you will know that what you’re writing about this joint Maghreb bid that would be a lot more feasible is an absolute non starter. I’ll briefly explain why after this post but it’s threefold basically: geopolitical, infrastructural, state of Algeria.

                But let’s go back to your cutting comment about my post. Please bear in mind that this is a forum where people debate, exchange ideas and viewpoints and so on in the best practical way they can, in the time they have at their disposal, sometimes while multitasking (I’m often working, writing, gardening or doing rudimentary DIY stuff while typing), people don’t necessarily need or feel the need to be anally precise or forensically thorough about everything and every topic at hand, therefore oversights happen, not that mine was an oversight at all since I more than mentioned what you say I didn't. The level of individual engagement on each post is usually made clear by the context and the thread topic. You come on here, after being largely absent for months, and a snarky comment about my post which was clearly written mainly to give the lowdown on the situation there to Ofters (so, mainly Anglophones) who may be less au fait than Francophones on what’s going on there, given that it’s debated far more in the French media than in the Anglo ones, for obvious reasons. However, all that would be OK… if only you were right on this one. But your comment about me "obscuring this basic [puppet] fact" is groundless, I’ll explain below and will continue on other posts as it's an interesting debate. Of course, some of the stuff you say above I agree with, I'll point them out.

                You write as if you haven’t read my post TBH. Of course, my "long narrative about the Moroccan dynasty didn’t obscure this basic [puppet] fact", I simply express it in a different way, but it’s all there in my post, my explanations encapsulate that puppet fact, eg when I explain that France has long had a strong stake in the regime there, hence Hassan II’s volte-face post Gilles Perrault’s book, which I mention. I also quote the wiki on Gilles Perrault’s book: “(Our Friend the King, 1993) about the regime and human rights abuses of Hassan II, at the time king of Morocco, who had until then been reported positively because of his close relations with the Western world)”, making clear that he is indeed a puppet. I really made that bit pretty clear. As I made it clear that I hate the man (as do Moroccan friends or acquaintances of mine in France and over there too, I’ve been a couple of times), so I have no reason to "obscure" something like that, none whatsoever.

                Besides, there’s so much to write about the Moroccan situation in just the few lines I wanted to devote to it, especially as I wrote in my opening gambit: "I don’t have time to develop now". You obscured that basic fact . I merely meant to give the lowdown about the Moroccan political and human rights situation re Hassan II and Mohammed VI, it’s meant to be a quick modest reasonably informative precis on Morocco (nothing else) after reading posts from Ofters who didn't seem too sure what sort of regime Morocco has, I wrote that post to help people understand the broad situation in Morocco more than anything else as this is not a political thread about Morocco after all.

                I certainly didn’t paint a positive picture of Mohammed VI in my post as you can see if you do read it and click on the links, links which are there to complement my post, and I think they do, I think the links I gave make that puppet fact pretty clear. There’s a lot to derive and interpret for yourself from a post like that mine, one doesn’t need to spell out every trait about the vile man, the regime and the situation itself. Also, if one knows a minimum about dictatorships/dictators and their mores, that puppet fact hardly needs expliciting.
                Last edited by Pérou Flaquettes; 08-06-2018, 13:41.

                Comment


                  #33
                  Originally posted by Sam View Post
                  But FIFA's rules require matches to be held in stadia with capacities of 40,000 or more. If they were willing to use smaller grounds for some matches then yes, that could work, but they've not made any noises along those lines.
                  Yeah, probably should have checked that before spouting off. If they are expanding the competition to 48 teams (and, inevitably, to 64 teams eventually), you'd think they would have to relax the requirement sooner or later for practicality's sake.

                  Comment


                    #34
                    Originally posted by linus View Post
                    Bottom line - Morocco is a glorified Franco-American colony, and its ruler, like that of all other monarchies in the Arab world, is pretty much a puppet. Kevin's long narrative about the Moroccan dynasty obscures this basic fact.

                    Morocco has benefitted from a modicum of economic and social stability due in part to its geographical location; political stability by virtue of being located very far away from Israel, and economic stability as a low-cost labor center close to the EU.

                    Morocco is too small and too poor to support a vanity project like the World Cup, unlike the Gulf kingdoms. a joint Maghreb bid on the other hand involving Algeria and Tunisia would be a lot more feasible.
                    Re their relative social stability that you're mentioning. It is largely due to Mohammed’s economic outlook (capitalist and outward-looking, as I wrote and explained at length in my post #22 yesterday), the iron grip and stranglehold Mohammed VI has on the system (particularly on the Islamists, Morocco is seen as a shield against extremist Islamism), and the way Mohammed VI has approached the while Islamist threat issue within Morocco, it’s not so much due "political stability by virtue of being located very far away from Israel", I mean Algeria is far from Israel too and is everything but stable, Algeria is a basket case and a hotbed of Jihadism, what with AQMI and all that.

                    In short, what’s happened with Mohammed VI is that he's fought and diminished the influence of the Islamists and the Muslim Brothers within the Justice and Development Party in Morocco, he is extremely wary of them, or some of them, and watches them like a hawk, as he does with the press and so on, which explains what I wrote about the 100s of journalists and activists who had to leave Morocco (I provided the links). This Islamist issue partly explains why the everlasting state of the huge relationship problems between Morocco and Algeria, eg the border between the two countries has been closed since 1994, which BTW kills your suggestion of "a joint Maghreb bid on the other hand involving Algeria and Tunisia would be a lot more feasible" dead in the water.

                    Ah, yes, the little matter of the Morocco-Algeria situation, and the border between the 2. Situation between the two countries: absolutely awful, they've stopped talking to each other. Border between the two: closed. So how do you see a joint Maghreb bid involving Algeria and Tunisia being a lot more feasible exactly? I’ll come back to this point in another post, it has to be fleshed out.

                    As an aside, I totally agree with you when you write: "Morocco is too small and too poor to support a vanity project like the World Cup" (especially the "too poor" bit) though, I’ll come back to that too.

                    I’ll go back to the Islamists/Jidhadists/terrorism situation as it’s the nub of the problem in that area and is linked to the perennial border issue between Morocco and Algeria. That, and territorial problems between countries in the area, mostly with the Western Sahara issue that involves Mauritania too and, if I’m not mistaken, other parts of Algeria that Morocco says belong to them and have even tried to seize in the past.

                    Here is a good Figaro article on why Mohammed VI is wary of the Islamists of the JDP (sorry, paywall so only the beginning but it summarises the situation and maybe you can find the rest on the Net): http://www.lefigaro.fr/international...islamistes.php

                    In a nutshell, this is Algeria from a Moroccan viewpoint: Mohammed VI considers Algeria far too unstable, lawless and dangerous, full of Islamist fanatics/terrorists etc. to have an open border policy.
                    And this is Morocco from an Algerian viewpoint: Bouteflika (Algerian president, half dead now but still in power) considers Morocco too liberal, a drug-infested country full of drug dealers (cf the cannabis produced in the Rif mountains on a massive scale, it’s one of the pillars of the Moroccan economy) so he doesn't want to open the borders to these lowlifes.



                    Whichever the reasons, big tension between the two countries for decades, borders are closed between them, they hardly talk to each other, low cooperation etc. so that defo kiboshes a joint WC for the time being.

                    There are political and territorial tensions between Algeria and Tunisia too, especially since the Arab Spring in Tunisia (2011) and over bits of territory around Tébessa area and Constantine I think but the situation is much better than the Algeria-Morocco one.

                    You’re right of course about Morocco being too small and too poor to sustain (emphasis on "poor" here, that’s the real problem). They apparently would try to do most or the whole thing on PFI & PPP schemes to build the infrastructures but I am very sceptical about the legacy of this WC and the impact it would have on the overall finances. I recently read that Morocco would have to budget for about €17bn, it sounds an awful lot for Morocco.
                    Last edited by Pérou Flaquettes; 08-06-2018, 14:38.

                    Comment


                      #35
                      Originally posted by linus View Post
                      Morocco is too small and too poor to support a vanity project like the World Cup, unlike the Gulf kingdoms. a joint Maghreb bid on the other hand involving Algeria and Tunisia would be a lot more feasible.
                      I’d like to come back to this bit in bold as I said in my previous post that I would.

                      On paper, yeah, great idea, a united Maghreb organising a WC, the whole world would love that. Sadly, reality gets in the way. It really is totally unfeasible and unrealistic at the moment. This is why (it’s probably a non exhaustive list):

                      # 1. The Morocco-Algeria border has been closed since 1994. The relations between the 2 countries have been extremely tense since, well, the independence era in the early 1960s, a bit earlier for Morocco (1956).

                      The overall trigger for the Morocco-Algeria border shutting was the Algerian Civil War in the 1990s and the huge issue with the Islamists (I was in Morocco for 2 weeks in July-August 1995, I remember it very well, Moroccans talking to me about it, etc. It of course impacted France and Paris in particular with the GIA bombings). The particular trigger point for Morocco was the attack in a Marrakesh hotel in 1994, and other more minor incidents, for which Algerian Islamists were blamed. After that, lots of Algerians were expelled from Morocco, and vice-versa in retaliation. There’s been other bombings since then of course, eg 2011. (hence Mohammed VI’s dictatorial ruling style towards anything resembling strong Islamism, Muslim Brotherhood and all that, which I explained in the previous posts).

                      This situation pisses off Morocco as, of course, Morocco is a touristic, capitalist country with plenty to offer, so they would want to do business with Algeria, welcome Algerians in great numbers and so on but it’s impossible in the current situation. Hopefully, both countries will do the right thing in the future and open the borders but it’s still a huge point of contention.

                      The two countries are politically at each other’s throats even if signs of improvement are regularly reported (eg relaxation of entry requirements), mostly from Morocco by the looks of it, they seem to be keener to re-engage with Algeria. Like I say it goes way back to the post independence era in the early 1960s but it’s now been made worse by the Algerian situation and Islamist terrorism in general in the whole of the Maghreb (Algeria being a potential powder keg with no-one at the helm. The president Abdelaziz Bouteflika, 81, has been paralysed since 2013 - stroke -and is living as a recluse in his Zeralda palace). I’ve written about that before in the French thread, Bouteflika and the Algerian power vacuum. It was I think in reference to Hollande’s visit to Algeria and the Bouteflika health situation, and about Macron too when he visited last year).

                      It is really tragic that the Morocco-Algeria-Tunisia zone is so badly integrated. They have the AMU (Arab Maghreb Union) trade agreements which are supposed to favour commercial exchange, dialogue and integration between the 5 countries involved (Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia + Mauritania and Libya) but that AMU only represents 3 % of their overall exchanges, it’s pathetically low for a partnership (Le commerce entre les cinq pays de l'UMA ne représente que 3 % de leurs échanges globaux, ce qui en fait la région la moins intégrée au monde.
                      From wiki: The Arab Maghreb Union (AMU) is a trade agreement aiming for economic and future political unity among Arab countries of the Maghreb in North Africa. Its members are the nations of Algeria, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco and Tunisia. The Union has been unable to achieve tangible progress on its goals due to deep economic and political disagreements between Morocco and Algeria regarding, among others, the issue of Western Sahara. No high level meetings have taken place since 3 July 2008 and commentators regard the Union as largely dormant.



                      # 2. Linus, have you really considered the general state of Algeria at the minute (and for a good while)? There is absolutely no way they could host a WC in 2026.

                      Politically, economically (eg petrol revenues hugely down), infrastructurally, security-wise etc. Algeria is a basket case, and has been so, well, since the 1990s with the FIS, the Islamic Salvation Front and the civil war killing ~150,000 people. Basically, the Algerian Islamists of the FIS tried to overthrow the military dictatorship that had ruled Algeria since the independence. The Algerian leaders blamed Morocco for colluding with the Algerian Islamist cells etc. so the already-dire rapport between the two countries soured even more after that, see #1. It may have calmed down a bit on the AQMI front in the last year or so but it would be way too premature to organise a huge event like a WC there because of the high, sustained risk levels.

                      Few people could go there for starters, huge visa issues and so on, there would need to be serious relaxation on visa for Algeria as unlike Morocco and Tunisian, Algeria is a fairly closed country.



                      # 3. The infrastructures between these countries are dire, particularly air and railway, unlike Mexico-USA-Canada. It would need a mammoth investment programme lasting at least two decades and costing tens of billions. Whether it would be financially possible and and viable is doubtful. These are not economically mature, well-integrated countries with fluid traffic on large motorways etc.

                      It’s not just the infrastructure between these 3 countries but with the rest of the world, particularly Europe. I mean there’s hardly any international airports in Algeria, how on earth would they suddenly cope with millions of visitors?

                      As for the touristic infrastructures in Algeria, well, I don’t need to tell you that it’s extremely limited since there’s no mass tourism. So that would be a huge problem, where would the millions of people stay in Algeria? A temporary Gites / B&B / Air B n B system could be a solution in theory but FIFA would reject such arrangements I bet.

                      Obviously, the Morocco and Tunisia tourist infrastructures are OK-to-good overall but they too would need serious improvement in the non touristic areas. They're OK or good overall but not necessarily located where the stadiums would have to be, and that could be an added headache. Tourists could move from hotel to stadium if far but the whole network, road and railway, would need a serious update. Trains are very slow in Morocco but slowly improving (first TGV Tangiers-Casablanca opening this summer, just over 2 hrs between the 2 cities as opposed to 5 now) but poor throughout the rest of the Maghreb. Buses could be used I suppose, but long distances in Morocco and Algeria, not ideal in that heat. There is apparently plans afoot for a 2,200 km Trans-Maghreb TGV line (Morocco-Algeria-Tunisia) but that will be slow to materialise, 2030 at the very least, it’s a ginormous project and relies on lots of coordination and political entente between Morocco and Algeria and that’s a bit fucked at the minute.

                      I wonder about the road infrastructure too. Could it cope? Would need to undergo a huge improvement programme, there are decent-ish connections between Morocco and Algeria (but just not enough of them) and the A1 motorway (the Algeria East-West motorway) is pretty good, not quite finished yet but it looks very modern and adequate, 6 lanes etc. Morocco would need to seriously improve on the north-eastern area though, better roads, more points of entry needed and so on. Ditto the Algerian-Tunisian north-eastern side although I don’t really know that fairly under-populated area, have stayed in Sfax, Kairouan etc. but not the north-eastern area.

                      But all of # 3 is dependent on # 1 of course.

                      Comment


                        #36
                        Also I'm not sure that Morocco is a centre for cheap labour for the EU. The overwhelming majority of FDI in Morocco goes into Tourism and real estate. There's some textile manufacturing there, but if Morocco really was a centre for cheap labour for the Eu, it would be a much wealthier place.

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                          #37
                          Dude, there were plenty Moroccan migrant workers spacing away in the plastic tunnel covered desert of Almeria a decade back anyways.

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                            #38
                            that's not what the phrase usually means.

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                              #39
                              TAB, Morocco has been a major center for outsourcing of French/francophone operations, a bit like India has been for N. America, with call centers and IT outsourcing on one hand, and EU maquilladoras on the other. Not to the same extent as India, but significant enough to have an impact on their economy, and enough of a stake for French multinationals to promote political stability in the country.

                              Kev thanks for the long reply, I'll try to catch up this weekend after work. In a nutshell though yes, the joint Maghreb bid is idealistic at this point, but the trend in Africa as elsewhere is towards greater regional integration, partially buttressed by the huge Chinese infrastructure spendings in the continent. Algeria has had a remarkably low debt level to date, though there was a very recent spike, but it would stand to greatly benefit from a round of infrastructure spending (not so much in terms of new stadia, but in transport and tourism).

                              In any case I'm planning on sticking around this summer with the WC around the corner. Bon weekend à toi.

                              Comment


                                #40
                                Pas de soucis. A bit of a boring weekend for me I’m afraid, lots of tedious stuff to do and sort out.

                                I just hope Algeria will be able to negotiate the post-Bouteflika period positively and we see a sensibly managed succession, let’s hope that any internal power struggle likely to happen doesn’t create mayhem, unrest and so on. Can’t be long now before the old fucker snuffs it (elections next year but we know what that means there, eff all). But sadly I fear that we’ll see a continuation of the current rotten and totalitarian regime. Eg this:

                                British-Algerian journalist dies after hunger strike

                                Mohamed Tamalt, who was imprisoned after sharing poem about Algerian president on Facebook, dies in hospital


                                Will be supporting Peru at the WC.

                                Comment


                                  #41
                                  Originally posted by Hot Pepsi View Post
                                  Good question. Football is surprisingly not that popular there, I guess. It seems they prefer basketball.
                                  No, that's not true. Football is extremely popular in China, and most people follow one of the big European teams. Unfortunately the national team is really shit, and it may well be that the government simply doesn't want to spend money on a tournament where their team is likely to get embarrassed. And they probably would need to build quite a few stadia for a world cup because whilst there are a lot of stadia there, most of them are probably not up to tournament standards.

                                  Comment


                                    #42
                                    Vote's today - in fact I think as I type this. All 211 members get to vote for either bid or say neither is suitable. If "Neither" gets more than 106 votes then the bidding process will be reopened and European bids would be considered. If not, but neither bid initially gets 106 either, the vote is retaken with the "neithee" option removed.
                                    Last edited by Rogin the Armchair fan; 13-06-2018, 07:39.

                                    Comment


                                      #43
                                      First news of today (apart from the fact that Infantini apparently made a ridiculous speech) is that it won't be 48 teams in 2022.

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                                        #44
                                        Fingers and toes crossed for 'neither'

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                                          #45
                                          The USA/Canada/Mexico bid wins.

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                                            #46
                                            Does that mean that all three countries don’t have to qualify?

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                                              #47
                                              With 48 teams, probably.

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                                                #48
                                                Landslide vote in the end after all the talk of being on a knife edge

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                                                  #49
                                                  Basement for Rent.

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                                                    #50
                                                    So Canada, USA, and Mexico.

                                                    Hands up who doesn't want to see group matches hosted in Honolulu and Dawson City?

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