The coronavirus crisis that has claimed nearly 150,000 lives has thrown the world game into complete disarray and the entire World Cup qualifying process has been suspended indefinitely.
Australia are excellently placed to reach the final phase of qualifying but their remaining fixtures are up in the air.
UEFA's postponement of this year's European Championships to the following June - a period usually reserved for World Cup qualification matches - has complicated matters further.
Already the two international windows in March and June/July have been lost.
Yet even if FIFA accepts that a logjam of qualifiers around the world is inevitable and would present a logistical headache it is highly unlikely that it will be forced to move the tournament in Qatar to a later date.
The extraordinary issues created by the coronavirus pandemic mean that FIFA through its COVID-19 task force has to regain control over some of the confederations that are believed to be making unilateral moves that could adversely affect the game.
South America's CONMEBOL, for example, is understood to be playing hard ball mainly because FIFA's smallest confederation will have problems fitting in a lengthy qualifying series involving 10 teams each playing 18 matches in the remaining international windows.
FIFA might also persuade the South Americans to have next year's Copa America double up as World Cup qualification which of course would rule out the participation of Australia which had accepted an invitation to play in this year's event that has been postponed.
And all this is based on competitive football world-wide returning in time for the first available window in September.
The task force in its formal discussions with the confederations has proposed three alternative qualifying paths to Qatar.
If football fails to restart in the next five months the discussions will have to produce an outcome whereby confederations need to accept or agree to change their qualification formats.
If on the other hand play resumes by September FIFA has two more options to make up for lost ground.
Either adding more international windows to the calendar or keeping the existing windows but increasing the matches to three instead of two per window.
Football Federation Australia is believed to favour a scenario whereby the Socceroos play their remaining group games against Kuwait and Nepal in October's window and Jordan and Chinese Taipei in November. Arnold's men could then play the final round in next year's five windows.
FIFA obviously would prefer either one of the last two smoother outcomes so it could be able to prepare for and stage the 2022 World Cup as scheduled from November 21 to December 18.
Postponing its blue riband event by a year would be disastrous because this scenario would have a critical knock-on effect on such tournaments as the Women's World Cup in 2023, the 2024 Olympics and the continental championships in 2023 and 2024.
So at this stage the prospect of putting back the event by a year appears highly improbable if not out of the question.
However football is also about political wheeling and dealing and its unpredictability stretches beyond the playing fields to the corridors of power so you can never say never.
