The first ball will roll at the World Cup in Qatar on Sunday evening.

A dark shadow has hung over the major sporting event since it was awarded in 2010: there is speculation about corruption in the award by the international football association FIFA, debates about the rights of women and homosexuals in the host country or about the supposedly inhumane conditions in which workers had to work on building the stadiums.

The pub and bar owners in Frankfurt are therefore faced with a difficult decision.

Show games or not?

"Of course we don't want to support in any way what happened in Qatar around the World Cup," said Cem Kayar, operator of the Birmingham pub near the Konstablerwache, a place traditionally geared towards football audiences.

"But we are simply financially dependent on the games because we are addressing a larger clientele."

Economically dependent on WM

The operations manager Shaba Tagour of Sam's Sportsbar in the main station sees it in a similar way.

"You are left alone with the losses caused by the Corona period, so you are dependent on broadcasting the games," he says.

The boycott would only damage the bar even more.

According to him, a boycott of football bars would not change the overall situation.

"Qatar didn't exist since yesterday," he says.

The problems have been there for a long time, for him sport has nothing to do with it.

Opposite Sam's Sportbar is Gleis 25, a football institution, as owner Wolfgang Lehr says.

His bar is closely linked to some fan clubs of Frankfurt football clubs such as Eintracht or FSV.

"We have enough football crazy people," he said.

But even with them you can tell that the mood is subdued, especially since the World Cup is taking place in winter for the first time this year, when there is no real World Cup feeling anyway.

He too is in an inner conflict.

In his view, it is unacceptable for Eintracht fans to stand for equality and freedom, but then to accept without complaint that the national team is flying to a country that does not share the same values.

On the other hand, his shop is fundamentally apolitical.

"We've worked our way into a Swiss position," he says.

You don't get involved in things, politics stay outside the door, says Lehr.

His four children should have fun at the World Cup, they don't understand the whole politicization yet.

You only care about football.

“With Panini and Rewe collection cards and all the trimmings.” He is curious to see how the story will turn out at the end when it starts.

He will definitely broadcast the World Cup.

You have to be able to afford a boycott

The vast majority of pubs that are traditionally geared towards football take a similar approach: For economic reasons, there does not seem to be a broad boycott of those pubs that also show all other football games.

The situation is different where football does not play the main role.

The owner of the water house "Zum Gudes" on Matthias-Beltz-Platz, for example, refuses.

"That's absurd!" says Felix Wegener.

He is convinced that football stands for something different than what has happened in Qatar since it was awarded in 2010.

The water house and the square around it are a place of tolerance, the connection of all cultures and classes and a place of respect.

That's why he doesn't want to be a part of this World Cup.

"I don't want to offer that a platform," he said.

In the past he always showed the tournaments

that was worth it too.

His boycott will lead to losses, but he will manage, says Wegener.

Qatar is not the only one responsible for the dilemma facing the Frankfurt hosts, but also the World Federation of Sports, which actually makes so many hearts beat faster: FIFA.

An association that has fallen into disrepute due to corruption.

In the public perception in Germany, one of the ten Qatari World Cup ambassadors recently caused great damage by describing homosexuality as "mental damage".

The pub owners also say that such statements do not give real anticipation for the World Cup.

Football is also pushed into the background by the unlimited commercialization that Qatar stands for, for example, as the owner of a world club like Paris St. Germain.

"It's no longer the sport of the little man," says "Gleis 25" operator Lehr.

"Current football has lost a lot of what pubs like mine stand for." You have to accept this change.

The World Cup will show whether politics and debates about Qatar can stay outside the pub doors during the games.