That's what you get for getting someone affiliated with Manchester City to speak at the presentation.

Corrupt organisation plumps for mafia state. That'd be my headline tomorrow morning.

Just been released that we got 2 whole votes - and one of those was our own rep.

Why anyone is surprised that the corrupt FIFA executive led by the England-hating Blatter came up with this result is beyond me. We never stood a chance.

It also seems to be the case that two people who voted for Belgium/Holland in the first round switched allegiance to Russia in the second round, which is pretty strange.

That sounds like a tactical vote to get us knocked out.

Same thing happened in the 2022 vote. Qatar and Japan both lost a vote each from the first round

Round 1: Australia 1, Japan 3, USA 3, South Korea 4, Qatar 11
Round 2: Japan 2, South Korea 5, USA 5, Qatar 10
Round 3: South Korea 5, USA 6, Qatar 11
Round 4: USA 8, Qatar 14

As for the 2018 vote

Round 1: England 2, Belgium/Netherlands 4, Spain/Portugal 7, Russia 9
Round 2: Belgium/Netherlands 2, Spain/Portugal 7, Russia 13

How did Australia get less votes than 3 others that have hosted 2 of the last 5 world cups

Really don't know how we have come last. We might not have had the best bid but we certainly didn't have the worst.
I'm interested to see how this Russian world cup goes as travelling must surely be a problem. The country is huge and unless there is a marked improvement on the travel side of things I can see some issues. I also hope they don't do a South Africa and have huge stadiums that don't get used in the middle of nowhere.

It's been noted by a lot of people that I know that the two oil rich countries have managed to pick up the two tournaments.

It's called heredity.