FIFA’s task force has recommended the 2022 World Cup in Qatar is staged in November and December, the world governing body has announced.
The FIFA statement confirmed the task force had recommended a shortertournament.
It said: “The outcome of the discussions is also a proposed reduced competition days schedule with the exact dates to be defined inline with the match schedule and number of venues to be used for the 22nd edition of football’s flagship event.
“The proposed event dates have the full support of all six confederations. The proposal will be discussed at the next meeting of the FIFA executive committee, scheduled to take place at the Home of FIFA in Zurich on 19 and 20 March 2015. “
The statement said the task force was exploring the option of staging the Confederations Cup in another Asian confederation country during the traditional June/July window in 2021, and using another FIFA competition such as the Club World Cup as the operational test event for Qatar in November/December 2021.
Task force chairman Sheikh Salman Bin Ebrahim Al Khalifa said: “We are verypleased that, after careful consideration of the various opinions and detaileddiscussions with all stakeholders, we have identified what we believe to be thebest solution for the 2018-2024 international match calendar and football ingeneral.
“It was a challenging task and I want to thank all members of the football community for their productive input and constructiveness in helping to find a solution that we believe can work for everyone.”
The leagues and clubs had pushed for a May/June tournament but that was ruled out on grounds of heat, but they are expected to push for a reduced preparation period beforehand and a cut in the number of international dates during the season.