Two weeks ago, late on a Friday evening, FIFA released its evaluations for both the 2030 and 2034 World Cup bids. It awarded Saudi Arabia ’s bid a score of 4.2 (out of five) — the highest in the organisation’s history, citing “a unique, innovative and ambitious vision for the ‘next century’ of FIFA World Cups”.

Fifa's confirmation of Saudi Arabia's hosting of the men's 2034 World Cup will be one of the most controversial steps that football's governing body has ever taken.

FIFA is set to confirm the hosts of the 2030 and 2034 men's World Cups on Wednesday, with a three-continent, six-nation bid led by Morocco, Spain and Portugal to be awarded the former and the latter going to Saudi Arabia.

Norway’s soccer federation plans to abstain from giving its approval when Saudi Arabia is confirmed Wednesday as the 2034 World Cup host, saying FIFA has done too little to protect human rights around the tournament.

The controversial selection process has drawn criticism. A bidding window truncated by FIFA, world football’s governing body, effectively left Saudi without a challenger and, just as with its neighbour Qatar in 2022, human-rights campaigners are already questioning the Gulf nation’s suitability to host football’s greatest spectacle.

At an extraordinary virtual congress Wednesday, FIFA will approve a Saudi bid decried by human rights organizations, via processes that rights advocates call “an elaborate fix” and “a sham from start to finish.

Confirming the 2030 and 2034 hosts should be done in a combined decision by acclamation rather than a registered vote. FIFA published each member’s choice in June 2018 in Moscow when the United States, Canada and Mexico won the 2026 World Cup hosting vote 134-65 against Morocco.

The United Nations’ top human rights official has pledged to try to ensure migrant labor standards in Saudi Arabia are “properly respected” around soccer’s 2034 World Cup