DOHA — Two million Hayya cards were issued to attend the Qatar 2022 World Cup, with Saudi Arabia coming first on the list, FIFA World Cup announced on Saturday. The FIFA World Cup revealed that the second country issuing the most Hayya cards was India, then the United States of America, followed by the United Kingdom and finally Mexico. Moreover, it has pointed out that over 1 million visitors attended the FIFA Fan Festival. After 13 days and 48 matches, FIFA stressed that cumulative attendance recorded the second highest ever. There was a cumulative attendance of 2,457,059 people at the 48 World Cup group matches, constituting 96% occupancy, which is higher than the 2018 edition in Russia, where it was 2.17 million. The largest number of fans in the history of the FIFA World Cup since the 1994 final was in the Argentina-Mexico match at Lusail Stadium, with a total attendance of 88,966 fans. The World Cup in Qatar witnessed several surprises for the first time. FIFA indicated that for the first time ever teams from all continents qualified for the round of 16. Three from the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) — Australia, Japan and Korea Republic — have reached the knockout stages, which is a record for the Asian confederation, after only two teams advanced in 2002 and 2010. Additionally, this is the second time that two African teams (Senegal and Morocco) have reached the round of 16. The first time was in 2014. It was not only the teams that made history, but the Costa Rica-Germany match also witnessed creation of a new history. Stéphanie Frappart not only became the first woman to officiate a FIFA World Cup match, but also, together with Neuza Back and Karen Díaz Medina, formed the first all-female trio to take charge. Portuguese player Cristiano Ronaldo also set a new record in his match against Ghana when FIFA indicated that he had become the first player to score in 5 different editions of the World Cup. As for the most watched match in the Qatar World Cup 2022, it was the England match against America. It had become the most watched men's football match on US television ever.
