The World Cup was opened by the match between Mexico and South Africa, at the famous "Azteca" stadium in Mexico City, which is hosting the world's best national teams for the third time. The title is defended by Argentina, which, along with Spain, France, England and Brazil, is among the biggest favorites to win the first place, and who will lift the "Golden Globe" - we will find out only late in the evening of July 19.
SPECTACLE AND MONEY
The biggest part of Fifa's income comes from the World Cup, so it's no surprise that president Gianni Infantino and his team have kicked the money-making machine into fifth gear. Until 1978, the finals of the World Cup brought together 16 of the world's best national teams, and in 1982, the number of participants increased to 24, and in 1998, until the last championship in Qatar, 32 teams competed.
The Mastodon Mundial will bring almost eight billion euros in revenue to the main organizer - they will earn 3,7 billion euros from television rights alone, and an additional 2,4 billion from sponsors. The host countries, which will be visited by more than a million tourist-fans, will also be upset, as will all football associations whose national teams have reached America - relegation in the group stage will be easier for everyone because of the 12,5 million euros transferred by Fifa, and each step further brings greater profit, until the title of world champion, which is worth 53,5 million euros in money.
Fifa also invests in infrastructure and education around the world from its profits, albeit far less than the European Federation of Football Associations - UEFA, which earns more than FIFA because it organizes the European Championship, the League of Nations and, the most profitable - European club competitions. FIFA still does not make money from the Women's World Cup and World Youth Championships, and covers those losses thanks to the huge income from the Men's World Cup and, more recently, from the Club World Cup.
The question is where are the limits of the football industry and whether the bulky world view will contribute to further expansion or will it satiate even the most interested ones.
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PLAYER EXPLOITATION
FIFA and UEFA match making machines satisfy everyone - from organizers, participants, manufacturers of sports equipment, publishers of albums, almanacs, books and various other companies, all the way to consumers around the world. But what worries are the additional obligations for the players, as well as the coach, and there are more and more questions in the public about the limits of endurance of the main actors. Soccer players who play in European clubs, which are two-thirds of the total of 1248 registered players, have already played more than 60 demanding games this season, so it's no wonder that many classy players fail in big summer competitions.
Apart from the fact that it will be played in very hot weather and that the road to the finals requires more games, the long distances between the host cities will also cause problems for the representatives, which will certainly affect the recovery and stability of the players. Additionally, several national teams have reported problems with accommodation, particularly with training pitches that are in disrepair and pose a danger to players. That's why games in stadiums with new, real grass, installed instead of artificial, which is the surface in most stadiums in the USA, are eagerly awaited.
Someone will say that footballers as professionals have to fulfill their obligations because they are paid enormously, but no one should become a slave to their work, and even less endanger their health, not even rich footballers. And to make it easier for them to play in the summer heat, FIFA introduced a three-minute break in the middle of both halves.
NEW RULES
Apart from that three-minute rest, the world football house has adopted some other novelties which, as they say, will prevent delays and additionally reduce the number of wrong referee decisions. Among other things, a maximum of five seconds is provided for the execution of throw-ins and goal-outs, otherwise a throw-out or a corner will be awarded to the other team. Also, when changing players, the duration of the exit of the player who has to leave the field at the nearest point of the out line or goal line is limited to 10 seconds. If he breaks the time, the player who should enter will have to wait a full minute.
A minute is also the limit for providing medical aid to a player off the field and within that time he must return to the game, but this rule also foresees a few exceptions, such as an injury to the goalkeeper or a serious injury, especially if it is a head injury.
The punishment of a player with a red card has been extended to anyone who covers his mouth while talking to another player and is only applied in "situations of conflict", as emphasized by Fifa. Also, a red card will be given to all players who leave the field in protest of the referee's decisions, as well as those who encourage such behavior - this means coaches and officials.
The powers of the VAR system have also been expanded: now the video referees will also react to the second yellow card, or if the card is shown to the wrong player, and will also correct the awarding of corners.
photo: ap...
MAIN HOST AND TWO SIDE HOSTS
The largest and longest representative tournament in history will be played in three countries and 16 cities, in modern stadiums that have been renovated or partially renovated (in Mexico and Canada), or adapted for football, as was the case in the USA, where most of these magnificent facilities serve American football.
Mexico will host for the third time, which is a record, but this time it will be in a supporting role. The "Aztec" stadium in Mexico City, which was the scene of two famous finals - the victory of Pele's Brazil (4:1) over Italy in 1970 and Maradona's Argentina (3:2) over Germany in 1986 - will now be satisfied with the opening of the championship, the match between Mexico and South Africa and with two more games in the group stage and one each in the round of 16 and round of 16. In all, 13 games will be played in three Mexican cities (Mexico City, Guadalajara and Monterrey).
The same amount will be played in Canada, but in two cities, Toronto and Vancouver – ten games of the group stage, two games of the round of 16 and one of the round of 16.
Most of the group stage matches, as well as the final from the quarter-finals to the final, will be played in 11 cities of the United States of America, a total of 78 games - in Dallas nine, Atlanta, Los Angeles, New York and New Jersey eight each, Boston, Houston, Miami seven each, and in Kansas City, Philadelphia, San Francisco and Seattle six games each.
photo: apEVERYTHING IS READY: Waiting for the World Cup
STARS OLD AND NEW
As we mentioned, 48 federations chose a total of 1248 footballers who will represent them at the World Cup, and most of them come from English clubs - around 200, followed by German clubs (109), French and Spanish clubs (86 each), Italian clubs (71) and so on.
The biggest stars are led by veterans, and for some of them this is their sixth World Cup - Argentine Lionel Messi (38 years old), Portuguese Cristiano Ronaldo (41) and Mexican goalkeeper Guillermo Mema Ochoa (40). Along with them are the hardened Germans Manuel Neuer (40) and Antonio Riediger (34), Frenchmen Kante (35) and Lucas Hernandez (33), Englishmen Harry Kane (34) and Jordan Henderson (35), Croatians Luka Modrić (40) and Ivan Perišić (37), Brazilians Neymar (35) and Allison (34), Egyptian Mohamed Salah (33), Belgian Kevin de Bruyne (34), Senegalese Sadio Mane. (34), Bosnian Edin Dzeko (40), Austrian Marko Arnautović (37). For many, this will be the last chance for success at the world fair, and it is to be expected that some will shine once more.
There are also stars in their prime: Frenchmen Kylian Mbappe (27) and Ousmane Dembele (29), Englishmen Declan Rice (27) and Bukayo Sake (25), Brazilian Vinicius Junior (25), Germans Kai Havertz (27) and Jemal Musiala (25), Spaniards Rodri (29) and Olmo (28), Uruguayan Federico Valverde (27), Norwegian Erling Haaland (26), Moroccan Brahim Dias. (26).
All of them have more big competitions ahead of them, and there are also young stars making their debut at the World Cup - Spanish Lamin Jamal (20) and Pedri (23), French Michel Olisse (23), Portuguese Joao Neves (21), Bosnian Esmin Barjaktarević (21), Brazilian Endrik Moreira (20), Turkish Arda Guler (21).
FAVORITES
According to the professional public, and in bookmakers, the highest chances of winning the title are given to the current European champion Spain (odds 5,50). It is followed by two more European national teams - France (6,00) and England (7,00), and two South American teams - Argentina and Brazil (both 9,00), and then a series of European selections - Portugal (11,00), Germany (15,00), the Netherlands (21,00), Norway (26,00) and Belgium (34,00). The Moroccan national team, semi-finalists from the last World Cup in Qatar, is in 13th place to win the title (odds 51,00), according to bookmakers, and Croatia, although the winner of the silver medal in Russia in 2018 and bronze in Qatar in 2022, is listed in the table of favorites in 18th place with bookmakers' odds of 81,00, as well as Switzerland, Turkey and Mexico.
The increase in the number of participants has brought many outsiders to the World Cup, such as Kurosa and Haiti, and they are given the least chance of winning the title and making it to the second round. As the favored national teams are full of overtired players from the leading European clubs, it is realistic to expect that some of the mid-strength national teams, such as South Korea, Austria, Senegal, Egypt and Bosnia and Herzegovina, will surprise the favorites, both in the group stage and in the elimination phase. For the first time, sixteen finals will be played at the World Championship, that is, the eliminations will begin with 32 teams, which gives the outsiders a chance.
WORLD CUP WITHOUT SERBIA
Since the restoration of statehood in 2006, the Serbian national team has participated in three out of five world championships, and it is interesting that our national team, under various names, after 1962 and the performance in Chile, never again played championships on the American continents - it missed the world championships in Mexico in 1970 and 1986, in Argentina in 1978, in the United States of America in 1994, and in Brazil in 2014. year, and now he will miss another World Cup on the other side of the Atlantic.
The Serbian national team under coach Dragan Stojković experienced a fiasco in the qualifiers: first they were outclassed by England in Belgrade with 5:0, and then they lost to Albania (1:0) at home, a decisive game in the fight for second place and placement in the playoffs. Even with the arrival of the new coach Veljko Paunović, better days did not dawn on the Serbian national team, on the contrary, it became a team for "shooting", which was best demonstrated by the defeats in friendly matches with Cape Verde Islands (3:0) and Mexico (5:1).
For consolation, among the 16 travelers to the World Cup from Europe, there is no four-time world champion from Italy, nor from Denmark, Poland, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Greece...
MIDNIGHT TRANSMISSIONS
Apart from the players and coaching staffs who will play in the summer heat and travel thousands of kilometers from city to city, it will be hard for television viewers in Europe, Africa and part of Asia, because according to their time, most of the games will start after midnight, and some even at dawn.
But neither those midnight appointments, nor all the anomalies that follow this football spectacle, will not prevent hundreds of millions of football fans and fanatics from following the matches closely, especially those who are lucky enough to have their own representatives - to cheer, cheer them on, and tear their nerves. Of course, even those who won't be able to cheer on their national teams will find favorites and favorites. This chronicler has opted for the "Dragons" from Bosnia and Herzegovina, who will perform for the first time already tomorrow (Friday, 21 p.m.), in Toronto, in a duel with the host Canada.
Participants
With the new increase in the number of participants, FIFA gave many teams from Africa, Asia, both Americas and Oceania a chance to get their hands on the World Cup, so it is not surprising that as many as four teams are making their debut: Cape Verde, Jordan, Uzbekistan and Curaçao.
The Europeans gained the least from the expansion and instead of 13 they will have 16 national teams, while Africa and Asia doubled the number of participants. At the championships in 1954 and 1958, European national teams made up three quarters of the participants (12 out of 16), and from then until 1978, they would have two thirds. The share decreased slightly with the expansion to 24 participants, so that, after the increase to 32 participants, European teams would make up slightly less than half, and in the first tournament with 48 teams, which is ahead of us, their share will drop to a third.
EUROPE (Uefa) – 16: Austria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Belgium, England, Germany, Norway, Portugal, Turkey, France, Netherlands, Croatia, Czech Republic, Switzerland, Sweden, Scotland and Spain;
AFRICA (Caf) – 10: Algeria, Ghana, DR Congo, Egypt, Cape Verde, South Africa, Morocco, Ivory Coast, Senegal and Tunisia;
ASIA (AFC) – 9: Australia, Iraq, Iran, Japan, Jordan, South Korea, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Uzbekistan;
SOUTH AMERICA (Conembol) – 6: Argentina, Brazil, Ecuador, Colombia, Paraguay and Uruguay;
NORTH AMERICA (Concacaf) – 6: Canada, Curaçao, Mexico, Panama, USA and Haiti;
OCEANIA (OFK) – 1: New Zealand.
Jerseys
photo: ap...
Until the beginning of the seventies, national team jerseys were only basic clothing, but modern times have turned them into fashion and status symbols, and a kind of relics. And not only are current jerseys of the national teams being bought en masse, but the industry has released collections of retro jerseys from the time when that piece of fabric was not given much attention.
Before the 23rd World Cup, the national teams are "decorated" with new jerseys, woven from modern synthetic materials and dotted with digital graphics. Fashion experts compiled a list of the best designed jerseys for a well-known American portal and put the jersey of Ghana ("Puma") in first place, followed by the jerseys of Brazil ("Nike"), England ("Nike") and Germany ("Adidas"). They declared the jerseys of Croatia ("Najki") and Canada ("Najki" again) to be the ugliest.
Out of 48 national teams, he wore the most "Adidas" - 14, followed by "Nike" 13 and "Puma" 12. Far behind are "Kelme" (2), "Kappa" (1), "Marathon" (1), etc. Interestingly, after the World Cup, the German national team, after more than 70 years of cooperation with Adidas, will wear Nike jerseys.
