Many of us, seasoned and obsessive viewers of football at the stadium or on TV, came reluctantly to the spectacle of this year's Fifa World Cup. Not only was the lead-up to this global watchfest, through indescribably tasteless promotion and toadying by Fifa president Gianni Infantino, calculated to repel us, but evidence of racial and political bias multiplied apace as the tournament got underway.Nevertheless, fandom is a complex psychological disorder, as Nick Hornby's classic 1992 auto-analysis, Fever Pitch, demonstrated. So, despite my own resolve not to watch a single match, I was sucked in like all the rest, paying up resentfully for the glitchy and exorbitantly priced ZEE5 app, and staying up night after night to get my football fix.
This was partly because of the extended format of this year's tournament, 48 teams instead of 32, bringing little-known countries (but mostly known players), onto the world stage. On the one hand, this helped Argentina to advance to the semifinals without meeting a single top-15 Fifa-ranked team, where they knocked out England, ranked 4. (Arguably, Spain, France and England, the other three semifinalists, were more severely tested by facing at least two top-15-ranked teams in their run-up.)Also Read: Pele's 1958 FIFA World Cup final jersey sold for a whopping $5 million at US auction houseOn the other hand, we witnessed fantastic displays of skill, strength and resilience from teams like Cabo Verde (drawing with Spain and Uruguay, and threatening Argentina in the Round of 32), DR Congo (striking fear into England), Iran (ranked 20 and undefeated in the group), and obviously Norway, ranked 31 and in the quarterfinals. The stars all dazzled, including the ageless Lionel Messi, Kylian Mbappe, Michael Olise, Ousmane Dembele, Mohamed Salah, Erling Haaland, Harry Kane, Jude Bellingham, Rodri, Lamine Yamal, and even Vinicius Junior in a ragged Brazil team.But more names stood out: 40-yr-old Cabo Verde goalkeeper Vozinha, Egypt custodian Mostafa Shobeir, 18-yr-old Ayyoub Bouaddi of Morocco, 17-yr-old Gilberto Mora of Mexico, and Enzo Fernandez of Argentina. All this made for huge excitement in the early stages, and raised hopes of real upsets in the quarterfinals and semifinals.But no. The semifinals featured the top 4 teams: Argentina, Spain, France and England. Were they helped to get there by refereeing decisions, including questionable uses of VAR technology? VAR disallowed a wonder goal by Egypt, but the referee failed to refer Argentina's decider in that match to VAR after what looked like a foul on Salah in the penalty area. This drew outrage from Egypt, and stoked conspiracy theories worldwide.
