This Is Shaping Up To Be a World Cup for the Ages

Cape Verde’s tie with Spain might have been one of only three games out of the 40 played so far at the FIFA World Cup in USA, Canada and Mexico, which has now entered its twelfth day, to be devoid of goals. Yet the scoreless draw encapsulated the drama, chaos, excitement, and unpredictability that accounts for why the World Cup is the biggest, most-watched sporting spectacle on earth.Nobody expected Cape Verde would get a result against Spain, one of the tournament favorites. Yet they held on for a tie, fuelled by the heroics of 40-year-old goalkeeper Vozinha who made seven saves to keep the Spaniards at bay. Illustrating the sudden nature of today’s sporting stardom, Vozinha’s Instagram follower count soared from 56,000 to 10 million in the 24 hours after the tie. And at a time when gamesmanship and dark arts are at an all-time high on the soccer pitch, Cape Verde — a small island nation that is one of Africa’s least populous countries — played the right way, committing just one foul against Spain, the fewest number of infringements since World Cup records began in 1966. While the group stages of the World Cup are still ongoing to determine which 32 teams will progress to the next round, Cape Verde’s inspirational journey epitomizes the way the tournament has confounded doubters who predicted discord and disaster. Quite simply, the thrilling contests and exuberant crowds you’re seeing at the World Cup surpass those at other elite sporting events.As Landon Donovan, a three-time U.S. World Cup player, said while commentating for Fox Sports on Brazil’s 3–0 win over Haiti last Friday: “The World Cup has been great so far and is likely to get even better” as the stakes get higher. Here are five observations worth bearing in mind as the competition nears the elimination rounds:Skeptics SilencedPrior to the commencement of the World Cup, the critical consensus was clear: Hordes of fans would be unable to enter America; President Trump would garishly place himself front and center of proceedings; as part of its ongoing quest to fleece fans, FIFA would fatally devalue its soccer show.The World Cup has not been completely controversy-free. The exorbitant ticket prices — it transpires it’s a steal if your ticket costs under $500; the treatment of the Iranian team; transportation woes. All of these remain significant concerns. Mark Glanville, son of the late pre-eminent World Cup historian Brian Glanville, recently wrote in compellingly principled fashion for the Sun about how he would not be watching a single kick of the tournament owing to his unease over how ugly the beautiful game has become.Yet confusingly many of the World Cup haters showed up at the World Cup. Take Gary Lineker, winner of the 1986 World Cup Golden Boot for most tournament goals, as a striker for England, whose outspoken views on Gaza forced him out of the BBC where he was the main soccer anchorman. Mr. Lineker, who is instead presenting a Netflix podcast “The Rest is Football,” from Times Square, said before the competition, “This time we’ve got a first, probably I think, we’ve got the host nation at war with one of the competing countries, you’ve got an unpredictable leader…I am a little bit more nervous about this one, I think, than others, for obvious reasons.”The naysayers have not gone away. Predictably the New York Times has so far not had a good tournament, with an article via its website The Athletic fixating on the ethnicity of individual team players and another dispatch absurdly, in view of the rest of its criticism of the current incumbent of the White House, taking shots at President Trump for not becoming more involved with the World Cup.Yet the skepticism has been overtaken by the tournament spectacularly capturing the imagination across USA, Canada and Mexico, both at an individual and community level. Scotland’s fans’ heartfelt embrace of Boston, where their team was based for its first two matches, and the viral exploits of German super-fan Freddy are two examples among many.Old GuardThe World Cup is renowned for resulting in hitherto unknown players becoming overnight sensations — think Pelé in 1958 or Salvatore “Toto” Schillachi in 1990. It’s too early to definitively say who the most notable up-and-comers will be but this year the world’s veteran stars are hardly dimming.Most spectacularly Lionel Messi scored a hat trick for Argentina in their 3-0 win against Algeria, the first time he scored three goals eerily came exactly 20 years to the day that he scored his first World Cup goal. Slightly blotting his copybook by missing a penalty against Austria, he then scored twice to become the World Cup’s leading goalscorer. Two younger world-class attackers, Erling Haaland and Kylian Mbappe, have also been in goalscoring mood for Norway and France respectively. Of the game’s biggest names, only Cristiano Ronaldo has flopped, barely registering an impact in Portugal’s dour tie against Congo. Whether or not Ronaldo rebounds, all the chatter half a decade ago about what would happen to soccer without Mr. Messi and him now seems distinctly premature.American DreamThe good news for America is their head coach Mauricio Pochettino has a commendable track record in improving players. The bad news is that this has tended to be at club, rather than country, level where the likes of Harry Kane and Cole Palmer dramatically improved under his tutelage. But with players like Alex Freeman and Weston McKennie performing excellently, their flying start on home soil, recording two wins in the group stage to qualify for the knockout round, has raised hopes that they can go further than many anticipated. It should be noted that Paraguay barely showed up in their loss to America, and Australia, whom the home side defeated 2–0 in Seattle, seemingly showed up playing a different sport altogether, Aussie Rules Football, given their thoughtless aggression. But with captain Christian Pulisic due to return from a calf injury before the knockout stage, expectations are rising that America can be far more than just agreeable hosts.ExpansionismIn 1990 there were 24 teams in the World Cup. Now it’s double that number. Prior to the tournament, fears were rampant that, as a result of the expansion, emerging nations would get punished in games to such an extent that it would diminish the spectacle. While there have been thrashings — both Spain and Japan won 4-0, against Saudi Arabia and Tunisia respectively, while Curaçao lost 7-1 to Germany — most of the minnows have remained competitive. Following their heroics against Spain, Cape Verde tied 2-2 with Uruguay and have an excellent chance of staying in the World Cup when they host Saudi Arabia. If it’s still too premature for a team from Africa or Asia to deliver the first ever World Cup for their continent, the gap in quality seems to be narrowing between developing football powers and their heavyweight European and Latin American counterparts.Fantastic ‘Footie‘To widespread relief, the actual soccer has been scintillating so far, and not only from the usual suspects like Mr. Messi or Egypt’s Mo Salah. Some of the finest goals have come via the game’s emerging forces. Take Cape Verde’s long-range free kick against Uruguay or New Zealand’s gloriously-worked goal against Iran. While recent Premier League champions Arsenal are a poster child for how soccer has become reliant on dull set-pieces and a lack of attacking enterprise, many of the goals scored at this World Cup via ingenious dinks and through-balls have presented the sport at its most attacking and entertaining. “What we have [seen] in this World Cup is the game is being played in a better way,” said Fox Sports’ rules analyst and former leading referee Mark Clattenburg.Let’s give the final word to World Cup doubter Gary Lineker who seems to have changed his tune while Stateside. “I’ve really enjoyed the tournament so far, there have been lots of good games,” he said on his Netflix podcast last week, adding: “The bigger World Cup is kind of working — some of the stories we’ve had from the teams have been amazing.”

This Is Shaping Up To Be a World Cup for the Ages

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