Sepp Blatter Gives U.S. the Cold Shoulder

All you out there camping out in line to buy prospective tickets for the 2018 World Cup in America, well, find something else to do. FIFA honcho Sepp Blatter spoke today at a European Union conference in Brussels, and amazingly didn't put his foot in his mouth -- just a shoelace or two. All he did was say that the process to host the World Cup might move to a continental rotations basis, meaning any thought of the U.S. Soccer Federation to bid for the 2018 honors might be moot since the 2014 event with be in Brasil, which Blatter considers under the "Americas" umbrella. Apparently he's never played Risk.

USSF President Sunil Gulati responded with some standard boilerplate.

"We've noted the president's comments as well as his previous remarks. As I've said in the past, we won't make any final decisions until we get more clear guidance from FIFA about the bidding for 2018 and 2022. We expect that to be in the next three-to-four months, if not sooner."

As a U.S. fan, the World Cup not coming to States in ten years isn't such a bad thing. The country is too spread out for it to have that special feel where all the fans travel and interact together. It's not like you can watch a team play at the Rose Bowl for the first Group Stage game and then hop on a train and catch matchday two in Detroit three days later.

Oh, and of course, Americans tend to hate soccer to being with, so it's got that going against it.

Blatter also commented a couple other issues Monday, once again bemoaning the foreign ownership in the Premier League, this time with the backdrop of the worldwide financial problems. He also said the maneuvers between the Poland FA and Poland government were "sufficient" enough to keep the Euro 2012 co-hosts in the game.

All-and-all, a pretty tame day by Blatter standards. Hopefully he's not turning over a new leaf.