Doha will make a fresh bid to bring the Olympics to the Middle East for the first time in 2024, having missed out on the 2020 Games.

Gas-rich Qatar, named as surprise host for the 2022 football World Cup, failed to make the short-list for the 2020 Games, leaving Madrid, Tokyo and Istanbul in the running as the leading candidates.

But that has not deterred the country’s leaders, with Sheikh Saoud bin Abdulrahman al-Thani, general secretary of the Qatar Olympic Committee (QOC), announcing this week the results of the Qatar Sports Venue Master Plan.

The plan is a two-year audit of the country’s 62 existing sports venues for usability and proposed 11 new ones, in addition to eight venues originally planned by the QOC.

Qatar ranked high in terms of technical ability in its bid for the 2020 Games, and also offered a degree of certainty in uncertain economic times.

But it has one insurmountable problem that hampers any bid – the harsh climate.

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