Buoyed by the initial success of the FIFA World Cup, Qatar is aiming to throw its hat into the ring for the 2036 Olympic Games bid. 

According to media reports, which are not confirmed, Qatar is planning to flex its athletic might by hosting the world’s largest multi-sport event in the Middle East, as the infrastructure put in place for the World Cup would pave the way for an Olympics. 

“The success of this World Cup puts Qatar in a strong position – they have shown they can do this… it is a proof of concept. They hosted the Asian Games in 2006; and will be hosting them again in 2030,” an unnamed source told Reuters.

This would be Qatar’s fifth attempt at getting the Olympics. The challenge for a Qatari proposal would be convincing the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to shift the tournament to the winter season.

So far, the IOC hasn’t revealed a timeframe for when it expects to award the 2036 sports extravaganza. 

India, Indonesia, and South Korea also have expressed an interest in staging the 2036 Games.

The World Athletics Championships was also held in Doha in 2019 at the Khalifa International Stadium.

Since then, the IOC has changed the procedure for awarding the Games, shifting from a traditional bidding process to picking a favored candidate from a pool of interested cities, with Brisbane 2032 being the first Games to be awarded using this process.