THE mastermind behind the 2022 World Cup has spent most of the last decade on a mission to proselytise critics of Qatar’s right to host the tournament. Now, he says, he is coming to Scotland to extend the hand of friendship to the Tartan Army.

While the focus of Scotland supporters is firmly on spring’s Euro 2020 play-off double header against Israel and Norway or Serbia as the national team seek an end to 22 years in the international wilderness, Hassan Al Thawadi, secretary general of Qatar’s delivery and legacy committee, has already envisaged a World Cup three years from now that involves the Scots.

Criticism of FIFA’s decision to award football’s biggest showpiece to the desert state has been wide-ranging ever since Qatar won host status in December 2010 and has covered a number of well-documented issues including the suitability of hosting a World Cup in the desert, workers’ rights, human rights, alleged funding of extremism – something Doha denies – and alleged corruption during the voting process.

Al Thawadi, though, has repeatedly sought to separate sport from politics while accepting there is still work to be done. Last month, he announced the country had brought an end to the controversial Kafala system that tied workers to an employer. One of the next targets for the secretary general’s on-going charm offensive is this country.

“We know the energy that the Tartan Army brings and we are excited because they bring a great sense of celebration inside the stadium and outside the stadium,” he says. “I can say that we are making a plan so that everyone who comes here has a great time, to have a blast and they leave with fond memories.

“One of the things I want to do is engage with them, too. I am planning a visit to Scotland soon enough to meet some of the supporters over there and learn what they want, find out what it is that they are looking for. Do they need information about us? Is there anything they need to learn? Is there anything we need to prepare specifically for them?”

And what of those preparations? The bottom line for Scotland fans is this: yes, you can buy a beer. Most hotels, and for that matter, the fan zone during the recent FIFA Club World Cup offered two-for-one offers at approximately £11 a go.

However, other hotels near the Khalifa International Stadium did not and there were no fan zones outside the ground during the matches involving Liverpool. Organisers say that by the time the World Cup proper comes around all eight stadiums will have fan zones serving alcohol.

There will be the possibility for fans to travel to more than one game per day in Qatar with a gleaming new metro system – tickets costing around 40 pence – currently serving seven venues which will be further aided by shuttle buses that will link areas of the city to the nearest underground stop.

The pace of change is visible in the ongoing construction of skyscrapers that have sprouted from the desert sands all across Doha and soon-to-be-completed multi-lane motorway systems.

Meanwhile, the conditions were noticeably mild during the Club World Cup with rain most days and comfortable temperatures of 26 degrees, rendering air conditioning within the stadiums – once viewed as a pre-requisite when the proposal was to host the World Cup in summer – almost redundant.

There was clear evidence, too, that the Qatari authorities – normally very conservative – were prepared to take a more relaxed approach to foreign visitors following an influx of thousands of supporters during the tournament. We were told of supporters urinating in the streets, saw and heard plenty of raucous singing and witnessed a blind eye being turned to shows of affection between couples.

The Khalifa Stadium which hosted Liverpool’s semi-final against Monterrey and the final against Flamengo is an architectural masterpiece but would have benefited from clearer signage while stewards needed more experience at management of big crowds. There was no mistaking one sign, though, which was set aside for “Ladies and Families” while the image of a thousand or so supporters attempting to squeeze through double doors at the Sport City metro station was cause for a flicker of concern.

Much of one’s discomfort with the World Cup’s presence in Qatar will come down to perspective. That is not to condone repressive laws on homosexuality or workers’ rights but to give some context, not least in the United Kingdom where we have just elected a prime minister who has made no secret of his homophobic and racist views or where a fifth of the population lives in relative poverty.

Russia demonstrated that, once a ball is kicked, the masses have a great tendency to forget all about a country’s moral integrity in favour of a perfectly-executed Cristiano Ronaldo free-kick or a peerless Lionel Messi assist. Does that make it right? No. Does it matter? Probably, but it has never been football’s job to find expedient solutions to the politically unpalatable.

That Qatar finds itself in the position of World Cup hosts owes much to Sepp Blatter’s politicking as FIFA president when the Swiss, desperate to cling to power in the late 2000s, struck a deal to safeguard his status as football’s most important man by concocting a plan to reward his trusted lieutenant Mohammed Bin Hammam by sending the multi-million pound tournament to Qatar.

The mere mention of Blatter and Bin Hammam conjures images of brown envelopes stuffed with cash despite FIFA claiming it found no evidence of corruption during the bidding process for World Cup 2022. Yet allegations aside, it is hard to escape the notion that part of the opposition to the Qatar World Cup has come about because an Arab nation won the hosting rights – beating England, among others, in the process. It is a conclusion that Al Thawadi, who believes Qatar has plenty in common with western values, agrees with.

“First and foremost, it is about breaking away from the stereotypes about the Arab world,” he says. “One, people don’t know that we are a football nation. We are a football nation – just as committed, just as crazy, just as dedicated to this game as anybody else. As an Arab nation, one element we can bring is that we are not different from anyone else.

“We have our own values but if you look at them they are shared by people in Latin America for example. Our passions are shared by people in Europe as well. There are similarities if you go anywhere. There are similarities to us more than differences. That is what this World Cup is meant to show.”

When Al Thawadi presents himself in front of a crowd at Oxygen Park in Doha’s Education City district, to address the children of Generation Amazing, a project which has brought football projects to developing countries across the region and beyond, he does so in grey sweatshirt and hoodie. He looks fit and athletic and flashes smiles for the camera. Shouts of “Hassan” go up from the throng as he steps forward to address them.

The 42-year-old is a popular figure, one who continues to carry the fight to those who question his country’s World Cup efforts. But above all, Al Thawadi, a University of Sheffield law graduate, has given a human face to a World Cup process that has often been asterisked by controversy. He says he continues to learn about himself and shows a resilience which indicates that Qatar will continue to fine tune as Al Thawadi seeks to deliver a World Cup to remember.

“I learned for myself that when you are younger you have an absolute sense of certainty whether it is about yourself, whether it is about values, whether it is about where things stand in the world,” he concludes.

“Over the last 10 years my experience has taught me you always have to have an open mind, you have to be willing to have perspective on things, you always have to be willing to see others’ point of view.

“The absolute certainty I had when I was younger, I don’t think that is there and I think that is a good thing. It is knowing when is it a good time to doubt yourself and when is it a good time to believe in yourself.”