The deadline for submission of bids to stage the 2018 and 2022 World Cups is now over. Now, a race against time starts for all nations to put words into practise and prove to FIFA that their country is worthy and the best to host the major event. England will be one of these countries, aiming to bring back the biggest international football competition home to its mother. England’s top priority is 2018, but there is also a possibility that it may be 2022.

England will face a total of 10 bids, coming from all over the world. Three of them come from the European continent: Russia, Netherlands/Belgium and Spain/Portugal. Only Russia is a realistic rival to the English bid, as Sepp Blatter has already said that if a single country from a continent can host the competition on its own, joint bids wouldn’t be considered. Spain is said to be considering breaking up from its partnership with Portugal and launch a bid on its own, but nothing is yet confirmed.

The other bids are from Japan, South Korea, Australia, United States of America, Mexico, Qatar, and Indonesia. Contrary to earlier perceptions, China did not launch a bid to host either one of the events. The rule of the football governing body which makes this more interesting is that no continent can host the event two times in a row. After Brazil in 2014, all ten submitted bids can host the 2018 event. The hosts will be decided in December 2010, and the losing bids of the 2018 event will be automatically submitted for the 2022 World Cup, keeping in mind the above rule.

Hence, should Russia, Spain-Portugal, or Holland-Belgium get the 2018 World Cup, England would be out of the running for the 2022 World Cup, and vice versa, meaning that if it is England 2018, the above three bids won’t be considered for 2022. On the same reasoning, should England get the hosting rights for 2018, the 2022 World Cup will be held in either one of Japan, Korea, USA, Qatar, Indonesia, Australia and Mexico. The bid which stands out for 2022, should England get 2018, would certainly be USA, rivalled by Australia.