//podcastplus.net/feed/podcast~697766b82ec1cc050845d8f3b8ec412a3952ab92ae78b6593f05066561f0761c The Qatar World Cup 2022 is potentially the most controversial sporting event since the 1936 Berlin Olympics. A story that is so bizarre and complex, it has sent sport from the back pages, to the front pages, to the long-reads in the middle of newspapers.Blood on the Sand: Qatar 2022 will track the progress of the World Cup through the World Cup Diary series. A short podcast episode, one per day, covering news from the tournament both on and off the pitch. Followed by a more detailed in-depth look at the history of Qatar, the tournament and how those two collided. Blood on the Sand is written, produced and performed by Adonis Storr (@theadelites on Twitter). Cover Art was created with Daan (@DaanGraphics on Twitter and Instagram). Music by WombatNoisesAudio (https://soundcloud.com/user-734462061) including the tracks The Legend of Narmer and Jewel Of Nekhen. Music was promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com and is used in conjunction with Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licensehttps://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en_US. Tue, 14 Apr 2026 10:06:06 +0000 https://episodes.castos.com/5f5a8c4e3de132-77761813/48762/4629b36e-2343-4920-b726-54e145a1f021/Blood-on-the-Sand-Days-Nine.mp3 Day 9: Cameroon v Serbia, South Korea v Ghana, Brazil v Switzerland, and Portugal v Uruguay   A couple of days ago, while promoting their crunch final match, the United States Men's teams social media accounts posted their two nations flags, but on Iran's flag, they had removed the Islamic Republic crest. In the press conference on day 9, Carlos Quieroz, Irans coach was asked about that. The most telling part of his answer sums football up, he said:   "I was born in a place in Africa. Some of you know my background. You don't know what one simple ball can do for kids who sometimes for one or two days don't eat. They don't have nothing to dress. And when we stop our cars, we open the cars and we put one ball in those parks. And you cannot imagine the magic moment that happens in the faces of kids and from sadness they change in one fraction to a smile. This is our mission."   You don't know what one simple ball can do for kids. One simple ball.   Football c... Tue, 29 Nov 2022 08:23:00 +0000 https://episodes.castos.com/5f5a8c4e3de132-77761813/48762/4629b36e-2343-4920-b726-54e145a1f021/Blood-on-the-Sand-Days-Nine.mp3 https://episodes.castos.com/5f5a8c4e3de132-77761813/48762/4629b36e-2343-4920-b726-54e145a1f021/Blood-on-the-Sand-Days-Nine.mp3 Day 9: Cameroon v Serbia, South Korea v Ghana, Brazil v Switzerland, and Portugal v Uruguay   A couple of days ago, while promoting their crunch final match, the United States Men's teams social media accounts posted their two nations flags, but on Iran's flag, they had removed the Islamic Republic crest. In the press conference on day 9, Carlos Quieroz, Irans coach was asked about that. The most telling part of his answer sums football up, he said:   "I was born in a place in Africa. Some of you know my background. You don't know what one simple ball can do for kids who sometimes for one or two days don't eat. They don't have nothing to dress. And when we stop our cars, we open the cars and we put one ball in those parks. And you cannot imagine the magic moment that happens in the faces of kids and from sadness they change in one fraction to a smile. This is our mission."   You don't know what one simple ball can do for kids. One simple ball.   Football can get so confused, so messy, so... Tue, 29 Nov 2022 08:23:00 +0000 https://episodes.castos.com/5f5a8c4e3de132-77761813/48762/4629b36e-2343-4920-b726-54e145a1f021/Blood-on-the-Sand-Days-Nine.mp3 https://episodes.castos.com/5f5a8c4e3de132-77761813/48762/18ea8566-bab9-43f5-b141-e901f5c6cb13/Blood-on-the-Sand-Days-Seven-and-Eight.mp3 Day 7: Tunisia v Australia, Poland v Saudi Arabia, France v Denmark and Argentina v Mexico And Day 8: Japan v Costa Rica, Belgium v Morocco, Croatia v Canada, & Spain v Germany   Hypocrisy comes in as many shades as a rainbow flag. If you want an example of it, you would do well to find one better than Piers Morgan. On the 2 nd June 2015 Piers tweeted: “Russia & Qatar must have their World cups removed. Both bids mired in sleaze & corruption via Blatter & his FIFA cronies”. A tweet which he has since deleted.   Piers has since taken a nice pay cheque to go and work in Qatar, he posted a photo of himself flying out to Qatar, his feet up, literally, on the furniture. And while doing so he has mocked the BBC for virtue-signalling. He also mocked the FA for the decision to not wear the One Love armband, “if you're going to virtue signal, at least have the guts to stick to your principles.”   For someone against vi... Mon, 28 Nov 2022 09:17:00 +0000 https://episodes.castos.com/5f5a8c4e3de132-77761813/48762/18ea8566-bab9-43f5-b141-e901f5c6cb13/Blood-on-the-Sand-Days-Seven-and-Eight.mp3 https://episodes.castos.com/5f5a8c4e3de132-77761813/48762/18ea8566-bab9-43f5-b141-e901f5c6cb13/Blood-on-the-Sand-Days-Seven-and-Eight.mp3 Day 7: Tunisia v Australia, Poland v Saudi Arabia, France v Denmark and Argentina v Mexico And Day 8: Japan v Costa Rica, Belgium v Morocco, Croatia v Canada, & Spain v Germany   Hypocrisy comes in as many shades as a rainbow flag. If you want an example of it, you would do well to find one better than Piers Morgan. On the 2 nd June 2015 Piers tweeted: “Russia & Qatar must have their World cups removed. Both bids mired in sleaze & corruption via Blatter & his FIFA cronies”. A tweet which he has since deleted.   Piers has since taken a nice pay cheque to go and work in Qatar, he posted a photo of himself flying out to Qatar, his feet up, literally, on the furniture. And while doing so he has mocked the BBC for virtue-signalling. He also mocked the FA for the decision to not wear the One Love armband, “if you're going to virtue signal, at least have the guts to stick to your principles.”   For someone against virtue-signalling, Piers sure does a lot of it. Perhaps he... Mon, 28 Nov 2022 09:17:00 +0000 https://episodes.castos.com/5f5a8c4e3de132-77761813/48762/18ea8566-bab9-43f5-b141-e901f5c6cb13/Blood-on-the-Sand-Days-Seven-and-Eight.mp3 https://episodes.castos.com/5f5a8c4e3de132-77761813/48762/96cb75b2-2747-4894-bbaf-2894a3d319e5/Blood-on-the-Sand-Day-Six.mp3 Day 6: Wales v Iran, Qatar v Senegal, Netherlands v Ecuador and England v USA   Day six began with the most emotionally charged game of the Finals so far. Wales v Iran. There was not the nerves of the opening fixture for either side as they lined up for the national anthems. Both teams knew this was their best chance at picking up points and progressing to the next round.   This felt like the game with the most genuine supporters from both sides too. Wales red wall group of supporters belted out "Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau" – meaning Land of my Fathers, with a roar befitting of their reputation as a nation of singers. They sang with hope, determination, expectation. There were tears in the eyes with the emotion. Back home, a thousand schools were taking breaks from lessons so children could watch the game.   The word Welsh means foreigner or slave in Old English and was the name given to native Brits by the Anglo-Saxons invaders 1,500 years ago. There's been a lot of... Sat, 26 Nov 2022 05:22:00 +0000 https://episodes.castos.com/5f5a8c4e3de132-77761813/48762/96cb75b2-2747-4894-bbaf-2894a3d319e5/Blood-on-the-Sand-Day-Six.mp3 https://episodes.castos.com/5f5a8c4e3de132-77761813/48762/96cb75b2-2747-4894-bbaf-2894a3d319e5/Blood-on-the-Sand-Day-Six.mp3 Day 6: Wales v Iran, Qatar v Senegal, Netherlands v Ecuador and England v USA   Day six began with the most emotionally charged game of the Finals so far. Wales v Iran. There was not the nerves of the opening fixture for either side as they lined up for the national anthems. Both teams knew this was their best chance at picking up points and progressing to the next round.   This felt like the game with the most genuine supporters from both sides too. Wales red wall group of supporters belted out "Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau" – meaning Land of my Fathers, with a roar befitting of their reputation as a nation of singers. They sang with hope, determination, expectation. There were tears in the eyes with the emotion. Back home, a thousand schools were taking breaks from lessons so children could watch the game.   The word Welsh means foreigner or slave in Old English and was the name given to native Brits by the Anglo-Saxons invaders 1,500 years ago. There's been a lot of talk recently of a vote for Sco... Sat, 26 Nov 2022 05:22:00 +0000 https://episodes.castos.com/5f5a8c4e3de132-77761813/48762/96cb75b2-2747-4894-bbaf-2894a3d319e5/Blood-on-the-Sand-Day-Six.mp3 https://episodes.castos.com/5f5a8c4e3de132-77761813/48762/390ea3aa-54da-4665-8ac7-09f4f5dee593/Blood-on-the-Sand-Day-Five.mp3 Day 5: Switzerland v Cameroon, Uruguay v South Korea, Portugal v Ghana, Brazil v Serbia In the 10 years leading up to this World Cup, Qatar's message was simple: everybody will be welcome. You'll be able to drink alcohol in the stadiums. You'll be able to wear rainbow colours. We only ask you respect our culture. So much for that. Before Wales' game with the USA fans were asked to remove, or had items of clothing confiscated, that had rainbow insignia on. Grant Wahl, a US journalist, was detained by security. He was taken to a room and kept there for over half an hour, they confiscated his phone and repeatedly asked him to remove his shirt. “You can make this easy” one security officer said. You can make this easy sounds like a line straight from a gangster movie. Perhaps when they realised that Grant Wahl has north of 800,000 followers on twitter, and the photo he had tweeted before they took his phone from him was trending, they realised they needed to let him in. “We w... Fri, 25 Nov 2022 08:12:00 +0000 https://episodes.castos.com/5f5a8c4e3de132-77761813/48762/390ea3aa-54da-4665-8ac7-09f4f5dee593/Blood-on-the-Sand-Day-Five.mp3 https://episodes.castos.com/5f5a8c4e3de132-77761813/48762/390ea3aa-54da-4665-8ac7-09f4f5dee593/Blood-on-the-Sand-Day-Five.mp3 Day 5: Switzerland v Cameroon, Uruguay v South Korea, Portugal v Ghana, Brazil v Serbia In the 10 years leading up to this World Cup, Qatar's message was simple: everybody will be welcome. You'll be able to drink alcohol in the stadiums. You'll be able to wear rainbow colours. We only ask you respect our culture. So much for that. Before Wales' game with the USA fans were asked to remove, or had items of clothing confiscated, that had rainbow insignia on. Grant Wahl, a US journalist, was detained by security. He was taken to a room and kept there for over half an hour, they confiscated his phone and repeatedly asked him to remove his shirt. “You can make this easy” one security officer said. You can make this easy sounds like a line straight from a gangster movie. Perhaps when they realised that Grant Wahl has north of 800,000 followers on twitter, and the photo he had tweeted before they took his phone from him was trending, they realised they needed to let him in. “We were just trying to prote... Fri, 25 Nov 2022 08:12:00 +0000 https://episodes.castos.com/5f5a8c4e3de132-77761813/48762/390ea3aa-54da-4665-8ac7-09f4f5dee593/Blood-on-the-Sand-Day-Five.mp3 https://episodes.castos.com/5f5a8c4e3de132-77761813/48762/ebac45e6-7bc5-4c9a-b5e2-50612c07386a/Blood-on-the-Sand-Day-Four.mp3 Day 4: Germany v Japan, Spain v Costa Rica, Morocco v Croatia, Belgium v Canada You can't silence democracy. For FIFA and Qatar every day is a school day. It could have been so easy. When I was asked by @Global's network of radio stations about the decision by FIFA to effectively ban the One Love armband, I hadn't given it much thought. To me, it was basically another fairly meaningless gesture in an avalanche of meaningless gestures. How many t-shirts and campaigns and altered logos have we seen down the years? How much has any of the equated to real change? In fact, banning the armband has highlighted and prolonged the conversation about it even more. In fact, this is the sort of petty spat that might just be the feather that broke the camel's back. Charles Bukowski said it best, “it's not the large things that send a man to the madhouse... but a shoelace that snaps.. with each broken shoelace out of one hundred broken shoelaces..”. If FIFA had just let the players wear the... Thu, 24 Nov 2022 08:14:00 +0000 https://episodes.castos.com/5f5a8c4e3de132-77761813/48762/ebac45e6-7bc5-4c9a-b5e2-50612c07386a/Blood-on-the-Sand-Day-Four.mp3 https://episodes.castos.com/5f5a8c4e3de132-77761813/48762/ebac45e6-7bc5-4c9a-b5e2-50612c07386a/Blood-on-the-Sand-Day-Four.mp3 Day 4: Germany v Japan, Spain v Costa Rica, Morocco v Croatia, Belgium v Canada You can't silence democracy. For FIFA and Qatar every day is a school day. It could have been so easy. When I was asked by @Global's network of radio stations about the decision by FIFA to effectively ban the One Love armband, I hadn't given it much thought. To me, it was basically another fairly meaningless gesture in an avalanche of meaningless gestures. How many t-shirts and campaigns and altered logos have we seen down the years? How much has any of the equated to real change? In fact, banning the armband has highlighted and prolonged the conversation about it even more. In fact, this is the sort of petty spat that might just be the feather that broke the camel's back. Charles Bukowski said it best, “it's not the large things that send a man to the madhouse... but a shoelace that snaps.. with each broken shoelace out of one hundred broken shoelaces..”. If FIFA had just let the players wear the armband, that w... Thu, 24 Nov 2022 08:14:00 +0000 https://episodes.castos.com/5f5a8c4e3de132-77761813/48762/ebac45e6-7bc5-4c9a-b5e2-50612c07386a/Blood-on-the-Sand-Day-Four.mp3