Even Fifa’s president can’t bluster his way out of empty seats. No manner of artistic licence or that creepy smile-speak-nod move can magic a person into an empty space and then do the same trick several hundred more times. After the first match of the World Cup not involving a host nation, Fifa has been embarrassed.
Gianni Infantino was in Guadalajara and presumably winced. On the opposite side to where the television cameras were based, on the halfway line, a block barely half full and with entire rows of red seats empty. On US TV, Fox did its best not to scan and reveal the whole truth. You can’t pull the wool over reality forever.
Each empty seat represents one of two things: a choice not to be there or an inability to afford it. Both are unacceptable. We may never know the exact attendance, for this has been an opaque dance rolling on for months.
Back in February, Infantino was busy telling us that every match at this tournament would be a sellout, alongside his claim that there had been 508 million requests for seven million seats.
Fifa president Gianni Infantino must have winced at the empty seats (Photo: Getty)
