Belgium–Netherlands 2018 FIFA World Cup bid Belgium–Netherlands 2018 FIFA World Cup bid Alain Courtois, a Belgian Member of Parliament, announced in October 2006 that a formal bid would be made on behalf of the three Benelux countries: Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg to host either the 2018 FIFA World Cup or 2022 version, but has since decided to concentrate solely on the 2018 version (see 2018 European World Cup bids). In June 2007 the three countries launched their campaign not as a joint bid in the manner of the Korea-Japan World Cup in 2002, but emphasizing it as a common political organization. Luxembourg would not host
Netherlands They were probably the most commonly used names, besides Flanders, another pars pro toto for the Low Countries, especially in Romance language speaking Europe. The Eighty Years' War (1568–1648) divided the Low Countries into an independent northern Dutch Republic (or Latinised "Belgica Foederata", "Federated Netherlands", the precursor state of the Netherlands) and a Spanish controlled Southern Netherlands (Latinised "Belgica Regia", "Royal Netherlands", the precursor state of Belgium). The Low Countries today is a designation that includes the countries the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg, although in most Romance languages, the term "Low Countries" is used as the name for the Netherlands