Not because 22 officials had received money from the Russian FA?
Generally when you miss out on a World Cup because you didn't pay enough money or offer substantial benefits to the right people then there's a fairly hefty problem. British media would've reported the same story against England had it been that way. Its what they do. Papers like the Sun and Co have no shame in ridiculing their own nation.
We'll have dished out a fair share of benefits to FIFA lads but our bid was finished the second Triesman blew the whistle on what they were up to. The only reason he didn't publicly do it was because they had their own redundancy plan. Which was to gather votes from their favourable members. We went into the bid speculating who had guaranteed the vote of which members. It was literally that bad. Eurovision for football.
https://www.theguardian.com/football...bribery-claims
Thrown under the bus only to be proven right all along.