It's Too Hot In Qatar To Even Watch Soccer

There may have been some allegedly shady deals regarding its World Cup bid, but I'll tell you this: There won't be any actual shade. In fact, a new study says that Qatar's 2022 World Cup will be too hot, even for spectators.

The International Journal of Biometeorology confirmed something I already figured would be true: It is a really bad idea to hold a sporting event in the middle of a desert nation in its hottest months. Seriously, there was not one day this past July where the daytime temperature in Doha went below 100 degrees Fahrenheit. Not. One. Day.

There's already been a lot of talk about how dangerous these conditions could be for the players. Even some of the more humid, tropical locations in this Brazil's World Cup this year forced the organization into unexpected water breaks at only 86 degrees Fahrenheit. This latest study, authored by German scientists, shows that even for the people who are sitting — and not running up and down a soccer pitch for hours on end — the Qatari summer could be be too dangerous.

The study used the Physiological Equivalent Temperature (PET), which offers a comprehensive look at the temperature and other weather conditions to understand what kind of effect it would have on humans. It found that from May to September, the weather "may be not appropriate for visitors," and suggested moving it to winter or another location that doesn't have a heat index most closely approximated to hell.

The study found that a more appropriate time would be between the months of November and February.

Does this look like good soccer weather to you?!

So, they might just move the whole shebang to winter (my vote, FIFA, is around the holidays so I have a real excuse to get too drunk in front of my family), or there is still rumblings within the FIFA ranks about it being in another place entirely. The study, however, was not trying to discredit the location as a whole.

It is not the aim of this study to show that Doha City is inappropriate for the FIFA 2022 but to find a time period with the most suitable thermal conditions for visitors and tourists. According to the results, this is the time from November to February.

Qatar is none too happy about the idea of losing its bid, and threatened to sue FIFA if they hold another vote. Soooo, Qatar 2022 is on, I guess?