What if the FIFA world cup was ice hockey? I want to do a concept series about that. Imagine if Qatar 2022 was ice hockey and not soccer. In this concept, the world cup is still in Qatar. The venues and teams stay the same. The big difference would be the sport.
This is an idea I had dating as far back as 2019. This idea was inspired by some Reddit posts that converted FIFA women’s world cup jerseys into hockey jerseys. JB Designs is behind the original concepts that inspired me. This idea is not 100% original. JB Designs nor I are the first people to recreate world cup jerseys as ice hockey jerseys. I see multiple posts every world cup cycle about it. The difference in what I am doing is that I am going more in depth. This won’t be just putting the soccer jerseys on hockey templates. This concept will be ice hockey inspired by Qatar 2022.
The viability of ice hockey in Qatar is the first thing that comes to mind. From what I can tell Qatar only has one ice rink. The top hockey league in Qatar (the Qatar International Ice Hockey League or QIIHL) isn’t a pro league. The infrastructure or base isn’t really there for them to host a tournament on the scale of the world cup for ice hockey. Let’s say that in an effort to get this tournament they expanded the QIIHL. Let’s say that they partnered with the leagues in the Qatar football league system to expand the QIIHL to 20 pro teams on the same level as the ECHL. Included in that would be multiple new ice rinks and arenas.
Now about the heat. Qatar is a hot place. So is Arizona and hockey exists there. If the same venues are used (which is what I am doing for this concept), all of the games will be played outdoors. Qatar is mostly in the 70s right now during world cup games. Ideally, outdoor hockey games are played in below forty-degree weather. There is already a president for though for outdoor games in warmer weather. The preseason outdoor NHL game in Las Vegas in the 90s was pretty warm. The NHL Stadium Series game at Dodgers Stadium was also around the same temperatures as Qatar is during world cup matches. I did talk to ice engineers before that told me that with the right equipment, and not in direct sunlight an outdoor ice rink could work with up to 90 degree weather. Also while not desired for a competition like this, synthetic ice could be an option. If there were turf fields in this cup I would say they would use synthetic ice. So an event like this is possible to happen in Qatar.
The logos for this concept are pretty much the same. The only difference between these logos and the ones being used for the world cup is that FIFA has been changed to IIHF. The top row of logos is the event logos. The first two logos on the bottom row will be logos each team and the refs will wear. The gold logo in the bottom row is worn by the previous champion. France won in 2018. They will wear the gold champion shield logo up until the final (if they make it that far). The next two logos will be worn during the knockout stages. They have the name of each round on the logo. The last logo is the logo the officials wear.
All of the teams and groups will be the same in this concept as they are in the real world cup. I do not plan on making any new logos for any of the teams. I am allowing myself the ability to use only parts of a logo or recolor logos for this concept. The jerseys will not be the same as the world cup jerseys. They will be inspired by the world cup jerseys. There are nine kit providers in the world cup. Only three of them make hockey jerseys. I already have some ideas on how to get around this. The goalies will not be wearing separate colored jerseys like they do in soccer.
The Adidas jerseys will be like the World Cup Of Hockey 2016 jerseys. They are the same as the current NHL jerseys but with three stripes on the side of the jersey. Hummel will have jerseys that are like American Hockey League or Canadian Hockey League jerseys. Marathon will have jerseys like the East Coast Hockey League. The New Balance jerseys will be like the ones they make for the NCAA. The Nike jerseys will be like the ones used in the 2022 Winter Olympics. One All Sport jerseys will look like the KHL (Russian League) jerseys. For Puma I will be creating something new based on some of the hockey jerseys they have released in the past. Kappa and Majid will be based on the Reebok Edge hockey jerseys. So they will look like the NHL jerseys from 2007 to 2017. Hummel, Kappa, Majid, Marathon, One All Sport, and Puma do not currently manufacture hockey uniforms.
Above are the venues. For more about the venues check out my post about the world cup venues. For this concept, I added what the rinks would look like in the venues.
Here is what I came up with for the officials. It is not traditional at all. It is based on the uniforms the officials are wearing in the world cup. The officials will have grey armbands instead of orange. The linesmen will not have the grey on the arm.
I designed the pucks after the official match ball. On the front is a recolored version of the event logo. Behind the logo is a design inspired by the match ball. On the back are the Adidas logo and AL RIHLA which is the name of the match ball. There is also a design on the back inspired by the ball.
Zac Electrifly 