World Cup vs. Olympics? Why Utah’s 2034 Winter Games could have some competition

Just weeks before Utah welcomes the world to the 2034 Winter Games, sports fans around the globe may be focused on an even bigger sporting event, soccer’s World Cup.

According to new reports from British media, soccer’s 2034 World Cup is set to kick off sometime in January of that year in Saudi Arabia, the only country competing to host — even though when another Middle Eastern country, Qatar, held the 2022 World Cup, the dates were moved to November to avoid competing with that year’s Winter Games in Beijing.

Saudi Arabia wants to avoid clashing with the anticipated 2034 scheduling of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, The Sun newspaper reported, stating, “Unless there is an agreement by the Saudi authorities to allow non-observance of the main religious festival — thought to be unlikely — a kick-off at the very beginning of January is being discussed.”

World Cups are held every four years, usually in the summer, but the Middle East’s scorching temperatures require the matches to be moved to the winter months. It takes 38 days to play the World Cup’s new 48-team, 104-game format, according to The Associated Press.

Utah’s next Olympics is tentatively scheduled to be held from Friday, Feb. 10, through Sunday, Feb. 26, and followed by the Paralympics from Friday, March 10, through Sunday, March 19, but “could also be celebrated one week earlier,” bid documents show.

International Olympic Committee officials expressed little concern Tuesday about the potential impact on the 2034 Games, during an online news briefing following the first of three days of IOC Executive Board meetings.

“I think the way you have to see this is that this is going to be for sports fans, a real feast during a period of whatever it is, three or four months, where you’re going to have these two events,” Christophe Dubi, the IOC’s Olympic Games executive director, told a reporter.

Dubi did all but rule out any overlap of World Cup matches and the Utah Olympics.

“I think that the risk of having those two in parallel is immensely limited,” he said. “What I know as well is that with these two being in two totally different countries and continents, from all standpoints, including a commercial one, we have virtually no risks. So what I see is a lot of sports consumption for all of us on any platform, on any channels.”

At this stage, Dubi said, the IOC doesn’t “see a major issue. On the contrary, it’s a lot of sports in the time frame.”

Fraser Bullock, the president and CEO of the Salt Lake City-Utah Committee for the Games that was behind the state’s successful Olympic bid, said he believed Dubi’s response “is very appropriate.” Bullock also said he had “no concern” about the impact of a January World Cup on Utah’s Games.