World Cup warning for Qatar

Officials at a press conference admitted that security had closed gates and shut out an estimated 3,000 fans, including some ticket-holders all the way from Japan and Australia, for Saturday's Asian Cup final.

DOHA // Outside the Ramada hotel complex on Saturday night in the civic afterglow of a terrific Asian Cup final, four young male expatriates happened upon a man with a badge and commenced venting.

They held up the intact match tickets they had purchased at one of the makeshift booths amid the shiny Villagio Mall.

They told of arriving at Khalifa Stadium around the 6pm match time. They told of finding the stadium gates closed for good, receiving neither explanation nor apology and wondering how Qatar could manage the exponentially larger World Cup.

As it happened, they had ample company. Officials at a press conference yesterday admitted that security had closed gates and shut out an estimated 3,000 fans, including some ticket-holders all the way from Japan and Australia.

Jassim al Rumaithi, the operations director, said, "There are some issues here; we have to settle them."

He said he wished "in my heart" it had not happened, and then he said his organisation would contact those with grievance or injury.

The security required to usher in members of the Qatari royal family mandated gate-closing at 6.05pm, he said, even though reports differed with one fan saying his camera shows gates closed at 5.45pm.

The ensuing hours spawned various disgruntlement and at least one injury. An Al Jazeera reporter said police had confiscated a network camera as it tried to photograph the scene.

He said a female acquaintance had bled and gone to hospital for an injection after a police officer tried to grab her camera. A Saudi Arabia man told the Associated Press he had driven 1,500 kilometres and spent US$2,000 (Dh7,300) only to miss the final and wonder about Qatar 2022.

A Lebanese fan named Farouk had an experience particularly irksome.

By telephone yesterday, he recalled buying a ticket two weeks ago for 60 Qatari Rial (about the same figure in Dirhams) and anticipating seats five rows from the pitch. "So you're fine," he said. "You think you're fine, that you can just go and watch the game."

He arrived at 5pm, made the considerable walk to the stadium and found the gate still open. "I was just standing there waiting for my friends," he said. "Everything was fine. Then suddenly when my friends came, the gates were still open, and as we decided to go in, they closed the gates."

His group thought the gates would reopen shortly, but as queues formed outside gates, there came no opening as the match began. A rumour held that the stadium had filled, but not only were empty seats visible through tunnels, but even the official attendance of 37,174 came up shy of the 40,000 capacity.

Contrary to rumour and hope, half time brought no opening.

"I had fans from Japan beside me at the gate" who had flown through Dubai to reach Doha, Farouk said. "They couldn't enter," and while they did not protest, "They were very sad." Some Australians left angrily, he said, "people who came and just waited outside the gate without apology and without any information on why the gates were closed."

Some fans tried different gates to no avail. Most did not depart because, he said, "We didn't want to let this finish without doing something about it." They took photographs and videos (with at least one on YouTube). Some wrote signs.

"No organiser came out to say anything," he said. "No one even spoke to us … They were pushing people back … We were just left outside, and we were just waiting for any media to cover us. And still now, we don't know why they closed the gates."

Concluding that "it felt like they were punishing us," he said, "This is how you will host the World Cup in 2022?"

That became a popular question, one al Rumaithi vowed would be addressed with security.

As Murray Shaw wrote for Australia's foxsports.com, "This shambles played out with a crowd of 35,000 people. Imagine in 11 years time when they're trying to accommodate crowds of twice that size."

And as the four men made off at the Ramada, one said, "They aren't ready. They just aren't ready."