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Australia will not bid to host 2034 World Cup with Saudi Arabia firm favourites
By Emma Kemp
Australia will not bid to host the 2034 men’s FIFA World Cup, with the writing on the wall that Saudi Arabia are effectively shoo-ins to host the tournament.
Instead, Football Australia will focus on obtaining hosting rights to the 2026 Women’s Asian Cup and an expanded men’s 2029 Club World Cup.
Tuesday marked the deadline for countries from the Asia and Oceania regions – the only two eligible confederations due to FIFA’s strategic manipulation of its rotation policy – to submit their intention to bid for 2034, either solo or together with other nations.
“We have explored the opportunity to bid to host the FIFA World Cup and, having taken all factors into consideration, we have reached the conclusion not to do so for the 2034 competition,” FA said in a statement on Tuesday afternoon.
“Instead, we believe we are in a strong position to host the oldest women’s international competition in the world – the AFC Women’s Asian Cup 2026 – and then welcome the greatest teams in world football for the 2029 FIFA Club World Cup.
“Achieving this – following the FIFA Women’s World Cup Australia and New Zealand 2023 and with the Brisbane 2032 Olympic Games – would represent a truly golden decade for Australian football.”
Football Australia chief executive James Johnson has made clear Australia’s international hosting ambitions.Credit: Wolter Peeters
Earlier this year, FA chief executive James Johnson flagged to this masthead that hosting the 2034 World Cup was on the agenda. He subsequently reaffirmed that intention repeatedly throughout the highly successful 2023 Women’s World Cup, when Australia put itself on the map as a viable candidate to form a joint bid with one or more regional partners.
However, it became clear that Saudi Arabia had been positioned as the outright favourites on October 5, when FIFA president Gianni Infantino invited countries from the Asia and Oceania regions to submit bids for the 2034 tournament and gave them 25 days to decide.
The oil-rich Gulf nation immediately signalled its intention to bid, and AFC president Shaikh Salman bin Ibrahim Al Khalifa, of Bahrain, publicly gave it Asia’s united backing.
On the same day, Johnson gave a statement indicating FA was still “exploring the possibility”, but the governing body had been silent since as it navigated the complex political landscape within FIFA and the AFC.
This was even the case when Indonesia’s federation came out and said officials had been in talks with Australian counterparts about a joint bid that could also include Malaysia and Singapore, and again a week later when Indonesia backflipped and offered support for the Saudi bid.
On October 18, Infantino implored AFC members to “be united in Asia for the 2034 World Cup” via video link at an AFC Extraordinary Congress meeting.
The statement from FA conspicuously did not support Saudi Arabia, which has a problematic human rights record. But it did make clear Australia’s international ambitions.
“For international tournament hosting, the Australian time zones provide significant opportunities for broadcasters, and we are within touching distance of billions of people in Asia and Oceania, which also helps to provide a strong commercial outlook for competitions,” the statement said.
On October 5, FIFA awarded the 2030 World Cup to the joint bid of Morocco, Portugal and Spain, and added World Cup centenary games in Uruguay, Argentina and Paraguay.
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