An article from news.com.au on 13 March, 2018,, author(s) listed as Debra Killalea. Full story in the link

Too hard to format the article. So I'll just leave the link.

http://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/real-life/news-life/sergei-skripal-fifa-world-cup-boycott-looms-amid-russias-spy-scandal/news-story/f60f604aaae5c03e32043489dde297ab

I highly doubt there'll be any meaningful boycott less than 3 months from D-Day (i.e. teams not going). But, if Russia is found to be involved in this disgrace, then it would probably be fitting if all HMG officials are forbidden from attending, same goes for Australian Government officials and a coalition of like-minded nations who actually will do something.

Yeah, can't imagine teams not showing up, too much money involved, but politicians is doable. Side note: it's sad that every time an authoritarian government gets criticised, they always claim it's a western plot to besmirch their good reputation. American movies give them too much credit, these guys are un-creative as fuck.

I keep hearing boycotts and bribes but nothing happens?

Any country that boycotts over that can go fuck itself. 

If a country boycotts they are banned from Qatar also. Rules states you play until you are defeated out of the tournament.

If there was a team boycott, it would surely have to be led by the UK (so England). But Theresa May's government has a really narrow majority in the House of Commons.

I reckon she'd think it politically stupid to attempt to prevent England from playing. Boris Johnson might well exert some pressure. But I'd be staggered if May's government tried it and risked losing her majority. The whole Brexit thing has divided the country enough, this would be extra fuel being added to the fire. Too great risk of going to a general election, Labour winning that and Jeremy Corbyn becoming PM very soon.

But there are other things she definitely can do without risking her majority. And I wholeheartedly hope that our government supports those measures.

Somebody in Commons, I think it was, described it as an 'act of war'

 There's been so many crimes committed as an act of war and many much worse then this crime, so for me I'd have no respect for a hypocritical country to act all good and boycott a world cup over an allegation. 

It's obviously not quite as huge as invading Ukraine or furnishing your sponsored-militia with weaponry which is then used to bring down a commercial aircraft (except for the poor individuals who got poisoned, depending on the how bad it ends up for them). But one crime after another after another after another without adequate punishment can, rightly, be interpreted as the final straw.

Boycotts mean the likes of Prince Williams and David Gallop not going?

Waiting for calls to boycott Qatar 2022 over support for Salafi jihadists in Syria.      *crickets*

Honestly, I think that's the whole idea. They're sending out a very clear message- if you betray us, we will find you, anywhere in the world, no matter who's protecting you and we will kill you.

The Kremlin can fall back on plausible deniability (as they've done with electoral interference). From a legal perspective, it ends up being impossible to prove, beyond reasonable doubt, that they're responsible. And, the British justice system (and ours) opposes any conviction which doesn't meet that standard of proof. And that's a good thing.

But because it's a Russian nerve agent it's obvious as fark who did it. If they wanted to carry out an assassination and leave other states doubtful, they could. But the Kremlin does not want to do that. They want everybody to know it was them. They want to use the West's laws and customs against them. Putin is laughing at May in her face and she can't respond in the way she wants. It's about humiliation for Britain and intimidation for those whom they think of as traitors.

This is the Kremlin version of sticking heads on the spikes of London Bridge.

I don't agree with anything you said that was brought to you via fake news. 
America bombed Iraq and killed hundreds pig thousands of people for nothing. And it was proven that Iraq co-operated and proved they had no WMD yet still got invaded. 
I didn't see any of these countries crying then did I. Or maybe it's because it's okay to invade countries and kill people for nothing depending on who those people are. 
Seriously fuck our fake news I wish Australia had a leader like Putin over the flop we currently have and have had in the past. 

Exactly thankyou! 

No need to boycott it. Can just take away their hosting rights and move it elsewhere. It's not in the next three months.

Are Syrians calling for a boycott over the Russians releasing a nerve agent in London?

USA should boycott. Probably Italy and Greece too. 

I still can't believe Italy won't be there. 

Fake news. Yep.

Plenty of us opposed the War in Iraq (funnily enough, often the type of people who get pissed off about Russian extrajudicial killings). For what it's worth, I also think that throughout the twentieth century, much of the behaviour of British governments throughout the Empire and Australian governments with respect to Indigenous Australians was immoral and criminal. That's worth fighting against.

But does that somehow mean that the British Government (and Australian Government) had no right to oppose Hitler's invasion of Poland because the British Government and the Australian Government also had blood on their hands?

 Yeh pretty much. Don't point fingers especially if you're just as guilty or even worse. 
Forget Hitler and any world war, focus on something small like what Putin supposedly did by killing a traitor. Can you honestly say America as an example hasn't done the same?
Just during the US elections recently someone got killed supposedly by the Clintons which was pretty obvious the hit came from them. 
No mainstream media chose to mention it. What I'm basically saying is that these things happens all the time. Mainstream media will keep talking about the one incident that they want to promote while refusing to mention an exact similar crime committed by the same people they're protecting. 
Any country if given a chance would kill one of their own traitors, it's as simple as that. 

They talk about Aussie spirit and not giving up but tbf the Swedes always channel some I dont know what in football and hockey games. They seem to have these warrior games, especially sudden death games.

Holland were better than them in the group stage but it didnt go their way. 

 No I wasn't shocked at all with Sweden knocking them out, just more so them not being in it. 
Yeh Sweden always perform good, they're no easy beats at all. 

I was shocked I didnt watch the first game. Didnt watch any of Italys group matches and just thought Spain was better but Italy still good. Looking in hindsight it was a pretty average group they drew except Spain. 

I hope Korea stuffs Sweden though. You get a little tired of people laughing when you say you qualify through Asia. 

I know full well the US have bumped plenty of people off. As far as I'm concerned, drone strikes are usually a case of just that.

You and I will probably have to agree to disagree on whether the list of Russia's crimes are just examples of 'fake news'. So, as it appears we do not agree on the underlying premise of culpability, our overall opinions about 'finger pointing' in the face of such grave crimes are obviously going to differ. As far as I'm concerned, given the Russian Federation's track record (assassination of Alexander Litvinenko, assassination of Anna Politkovskaya, Chechnya, etc.) it was farcical that FIFA gifted them privilege of hosting a World Cup.

Banning South Africa from sporting events genuinely helped to end Apartheid. So the notion of rewarding Russian ultra-nationalism is absurd. Then when, as all reliable military intelligence and scholarship has it, the Russian Federation invaded Crimea and was a party to the downing of a commercial aircraft, that should have been the final straw. During the last World Cup, they should have just said, right that's way too far.

As punishment, England can host the World Cup. This is just more of the same.

Every country has that <nationality> spirit that you only hear about after they win a game

WRT hockey, the Czechs have this theory about Swedes and hockey. It's a bit like the old line "football is a game where twenty-two men chase a ball for 90 minutes and then the Germans win"

I've watched enough documentaries on this issue which claim most evidence doesn't in any way point the finger at Russia downing the plane.
People will always say there are two sides to every story. And most people agree with this saying, however the sad thing is that not many people go by this simple rule. 
I don't believe Russia shot down the plane at all. 
Overall I understand what you are saying about countries doing wrong not being allowed to host big events and I'd agree if only it was fair and this rule applied to everyone. The world would be a better place, however that rule doesn't apply. It's absurd that anyone would claim Russia should be stripped of their rights, yet it's okay for Qatar to win it, even though plenty evidence points to them helping out ISIS and the many other countries too who are guilty for the same crime including England themselves. 
England supported the war against Syria, even though Syria didn't do anything to deserve it and to make matters worse actually sided with the Syrian Rebels aka ISIS and AlNusra over Asad.
I won't accept any country that supported rebel terrorists groups who beheaded innocent people claim that Russia should be boycotted and the world cup given to them because Russia killed someone who betrayed them and basically was a traitor to them. 

The international inspectors were denied entry to the MH17 crash site for days and when they finally got there they observed, in their words, "industrial scale sabotage."

You find me one innocent person that interferes with a crime scene.

There usually are multiple causes behind complex issues (rather than a single cause or two perfectly equal sides). It doesn't exonerate Russian culpability in Ukraine or with God knows what else.

This is the contemporary version of 'useful idiocy'. During the Russian Revolution, during Stalin's reign and right through the Cold War, plenty of people in the West bizarrely identified with political events happening in Russia (usually because of absurd ideological fawning) and became apologists for the bloodshed which took place there. To Stalin and Soviet leaders who followed, 'useful idiocy' was most helpful.

Substitute everything you just said about Russians and Stalin and the cold war there and replace it with 'Muslims' and you've got exactly the same situation repeated these days with apologists sprouting idiotic defenses of the indefensible.