The FIFA Club World Cup dropped by Abu Dhabi the past two Decembers. Kind of an odd tournament because it has a couple of famous clubs and then five not all that well known. And not all that many matches, either.

So in some ways, the UAE having its bid accepted for the FIFA 2013 Under 17 World Cup is a bigger deal because it’s 24 teams and 52 games over 23 days.

Anyway, the local Football Association is pretty excited about this, a story I reported for tomorrow’s editions of The National.

No one will have heard of any of these 17-year-old kids when they get here, but some of them will be famous someday and the fun will be trying to figure out who.

Also, the UAE is a compact place, and even if they stage some of the games in all seven emirates, as organizers are saying, nothing is more than about a three-hour drive from anything else.

This actually is a good place for something like that … and it also would have been a better place, for sure, than Qatar for a World Cup. The big kids’ World Cup. But you can’t win without bidding, and the UAE didn’t.

The final presumably will be played here in Abu Dhabi, which has both of the country’s two big stadiums. And probably the opener, as well.

So, yes, something for international football fans here to look forward to, two years hence.  It could get bette, too, if Abu Dhabi is able to convince FIFA to bring the Club World Cup back here in December of 2013, after it does this year and next in Tokyo.