I saw some tweet saying “Every world cup starts off with OMG horrible atrocities are happening at the World Cup and then once the games start, people go Best World Cup ever”. Funny because it’s true! Russia, Brazil, Qatar, and now even this cup had their share of controversies. In fact, the latest one had many!

• This might be the most I’ve followed a World Cup since 2002 and the glorious days of Ronaldo, Ronaldinho, and Rivaldo. This resurgence is fully down to my resurging interest in football as Arsenal have turned things around in the past few years and because of my desire to follow things outside of tech (which I follow voluntarily) and geo-politics (which I follow involuntarily).
• The expansion to 48 teams (which UEFA complained about as diluting the sport) was a resounding success, we had so many upsets! Cape Verde being the one who stole our hearts, they scared the shit of both finalists! They were one of many! African countries continue to climb higher; Egypt was stellar, Morocco played great, Senegal got last minute pipped. Norway too, a football minnow had a great run and much bigger branding success for Haaland and maybe the country too. In fact, I would say I was less excited by the time we were getting past the quarter-final stages because the games and potential results were predictable. We didn’t get a real breakthrough winning team like Greece in Euro 2004. Inshallah, soon.
• In the matches I watched I found a lot of creativity, unlike in the Premier league where the game has become a lot of chess with the Spanish style of tiki taka and heavy control spreading; in addition to extreme tactical analysis driving play. There was a lot of variance in play, and a lot of long shots on goal, which I absolutely adore and respect. Long shots are a high-risk high-return move, and when they hit the net they are one of the most beautiful things in the world.
  • On that note, I hated Argentina generally but one point I would concede is that they are creative with the ball and vary their play as needed, mixing dribbling, set-pieces and long balls. Counter-example is Mexico in the Mexico vs England QF where in the second half they kept doing the same damn play 20 times fruitlessly.
• The other thing on display was FIFA’s corruption and obsequiousness; the hydration breaks, the half time show, the “championship rings”, the peace prize, and of course the overturning of the red card against Balogun.
  • Everyone fumed about it. Obviously Trump boasted about it so we have a smoking gun too. While the interference obviously should not have happened, I think Balogun should not have played. He should have feigned an injury or found some excuse to leave the game quickly. That was an opportunity to show some integrity and spine. He didn’t.
• There were many examples of racism a la Britta in Community going “I can excuse racism but I draw the line at animal cruelty”
  • The top obvious cases are the mistreatment of the Iran team, and myriad of immigration issues which neither UEFA nor any European team or European media gave a fuck about. Obviously they only care about these issues when it fits their racial, colonial, and capitalist narratives of vilifying Brazil, Qatar, Russia, etc.
  • FIFA once threatened to move the tournament in the defense of North Korea. Today it won’t do shit about Iran not being allowed to stay or train on US soil. It also didn’t do squat about the Somali referee who is literally a referee trained and qualified by FIFA but was given a visa, then questioned unnecessarily, called a terrorist and denied entry. In prior tournaments FIFA has made a big hullaballoo about making visas quasi-automatic for players and officials and with a lot of easements made for fans too. This was the most disgusting part of the World Cup but I guess the real mistake was made a while back in choosing a loony host country.
  • UEFA only got its panties in a bunch when a red card was removed against a player. Sure Britta.
• This World Cup was the fall from grace for Argentina and Messi; their blatantly violent and aggressive behaviour was shitty and the icing on the cake was Messi looking to call fouls on everyone. It was a blast to see Enzo Fernandes sent off and their defeat was a cherry on top.
  • We’ve come a long way from the Penaldo days and looks like Messi was the Penaldo all along. Ronaldo fans vindicated! I say that in a tongue-in-cheek fashion, both of them are past their prime and shouldn’t have played in the first place. I don’t enjoy Ronaldo just hanging around the D nowadays and the media almost had me convinced that Messi is better, overturning my longstanding worship of Ronaldo but I’m settling it permanently to Ronaldo > Messi :D
• Overall the spectacle was great! We got to see good triumph over evil even if Spain couldn’t muster a single goal for most of the game and didn’t convert their dominance and possession into goals.
  • It reminded me a lot of Arsenal; Arsenal funnily channel both Spain and Argentina. They dominate often, playing coolly and passing the ball around but to no avail at scoring. Then suddenly in the last minutes they will score and salvage something! Even your team dominating but not scoring can be agonising!
  • It was a reminder that the spectacle is still a spectacle; nothing more, nothing less. If Argentina had won, we would all be salty, and complain about corruption for a few days, but soon line up for the next World cup anyway. The world would still be as good or bad as it had been before the tournament. Yet there is no denying that we need these totems for our souls, to not feel hopeless, to get a little cheer.
• I’m looking forward to the expansion to 64 countries, and then to 128 and then to 256. There are only 212 countries recognised by FIFA, so I’m sure they will soon fund wars and revolutions to create new countries and increase tournament revenue.