Morocco will finally get the chance to host the FIFA World Cup in 2030. Unlike in their previous bidding attempts, they will be part of a co-hosting arrangement featuring six countries. But things could have turned out so much better with a Maghreb World Cup bid.
Six Venues
Morocco will be one of the junior hosts in the FIFA World Cup 2030 even though they like behaving differently. Morocco will provide 6 venues and Portugal will get 3 venues. A greater portion of the venues will be in Spain. The question is up in the air as to which city will get the right to host the World Cup Final. Madrid is considered the favorite with Barcelona having an outside chance. Morocco is always throwing its hat in the ring by proposing a 113,000-seater stadium in Casablanca but this is problematic.
Post World Cup Legacy
Morocco plans to spend $500 million to build this giant stadium in Benslimane. Proponents of this project argue that the stadium will host other future events, serve a prospective Casablanca-Rabat megapolis and that hosting the final will raise the country’s profile bringing tourists and investors. But these arguments don’t hold water.
First, domestically, Morocco doesn’t have the frequency and magnitude of events to justify a +100k seater stadium. The domestic league does not clear average attendance of 10,000 neither. And there’s no clear path to Morocco establishing such a powerful internal sporting industry in the next 10-15 years, even further to be quite honest. The country would be better placed directing this capital to priority areas of its economy.
Secondly, global sporting events don’t have a track record of boosting tourism and investment. You can see similar experiments in Brazil, South Africa and South Korea. There’s only the boost you get in the duration of the event. Even so, all the financial benefit goes to Switzerland and the host country is subject to bearing the cost.
Talk of a Casablanca-Rabat megapolis is far reaching. In any case, each city already has a stadium that it fills only a few times a year. Why build an even larger one?
Maghreb World Cup Bid
In an ideal world, we would have seen a cost-effective and justifiable Maghreb World Cup bid. It would put to use existing stadium absorption capacity – so to speak, reinvigorated major cities in the Maghreb region and importantly, encouraged increased connectivity and intra-trade in the Maghreb region.
It would also allow for widespread improvement of sports infrastructure in what is Africa’s strongest domestic football scene.
And this is how I would have organized it:
Morocco
Casablanca – tear down Mohamed V and build an 80,000 seater facility elsewhere in the city. This would be adjusted to 65,000 after the World Cup.
Tangier – complete the renovation of the stadium to a 60,000 seater facility.
Rabat – renovate Moulay Abdellah stadium instead of destroying it. Maintain it as the main athletics stadium of Morocco.
Marrakech – ideally, this stadium should never have been built with a track in the first place.
Agadir – ideally, this stadium should never have been built with a track in the first place.
Fez – renovate it without cost of removing the athletics track.
Algeria
Algiers – renovate the Juliet 6 stadium into an 80k seater facility.
Kabylie – exactly as has been done.
Setif – build a 50k seater stadium in Setif, reduce to 40k after the world cup.
Annaba – exactly as has been done.
Oran – exactly as has been done.
Constantine – renovate the stadium in the city to a 40k seater stadium.
Tunisia
Rades – It’s really tragic how they allowed this stadium to disintegrate. It should be restored to its former glory.
Tunis – rebuild the El Menzah stadium without an athletics track and renovate the entire complex.
Sfax – replace Taieb Mhiri with a 40k seater stadium.
Sousse – replace the Olympic stadium with a proper 40k seater stadium.
CAF Observer 