A vignette unfolded at the very end of the trophy presentation ceremony on the pitch at the MetLife Stadium on Sunday evening. I think we are allowed to call it the MetLife again now, by the way, because the World Cup is over and FIFA no longer need to worry about impinging upon the profits of their sponsors.
You will probably have seen it by now. Rodri is holding the World Cup trophy, ready to lift it. President Donald Trump is lingering in front of the Spain team, staying in shot. Gianni Infantino, the FIFA president, scampers across the stage like the president’s personal assistant and makes a meek attempt to usher him to the side of the Spain squad.
President Trump ignores him. Rodri snatches a glance to the side where Trump is standing and satisfies himself that Trump is just about far enough towards the periphery not to spoil the picture. Then he hoists the trophy aloft. In the wider lens shots, Trump looks like part of the winning squad. Infantino looks a little embarrassed.
That image sums up this World Cup. The players – Rodri, Jude Bellingham, Kylian Mbappe, Erling Haaland, Lionel Messi – were so good, the Golden Boot race so thrilling, the matches so dramatic, the storylines so compelling, the brotherhood of fans so touching, that they almost banished the stench of how the tournament was debased by the FIFA president. Almost. But not quite.
Perhaps the way the tournament ended is partly to blame for that. It ended, not with a flourish but with a bitter, fractious, limping dirge of a final that was probably the worst since 1990. It was as if the tournament itself had grown exhausted by its bloated diet of 104 matches in six weeks.
It ended, too, with Argentina’s Leandro Paredes rampaging around the field at the final whistle as if he were auditioning for the next time President Trump plans to stage a UFC night at the White House. It ended with Argentina turning their backs on Spain as they lifted the trophy. It was a spectacularly graceless display.
President Donald Trump and FIFA president Gianni Infantino could not help but stick their faces into Spain’s World Cup celebrations
In the wider lens shots, Trump looks like part of the winning squad. Infantino looks a little embarrassed
It was not the final that the tournament deserved. It was not the final that the fans who had paid king’s ransoms to follow their teams across North America deserved, either. But it was the final that Infantino deserved. He deserved it because he debased it to a point where it was impossible for the players to outrun his deeds.
The quality of the football was as good as I can remember at a World Cup. Some of the matches that this tournament delivered were all-time classics. England’s match against Mexico in the Azteca, for the atmosphere, for the context, for the history of the stadium, for the adversity England faced on their way to a 3-2 win, was the best football occasion I’ve ever been to.
A couple of days before that, I was at Argentina v Cape Verde at the Hard Rock Stadium in Miami, where Cape Verde threatened to pull off one of the greatest shocks in World Cup history. That was also an epic encounter. It provided what, for me, was the goal of the tournament, Sidny Lopes Cabral’s brilliant curling drive over Emiliano Martinez.
There were countless others. Argentina’s comeback victory over Egypt, pretty much every game the swashbuckling French played until they ran into the finely-tuned team that was Spain, England’s heart-rending capitulation against Argentina in the semi-final in Atlanta and Portugal’s win over Croatia in the last 32.
Sometimes, at World Cups, the tournament starts at a gallop and then fades away but this one kept going and going, drama after drama, all the way until the final, when it fell flat on its face.
But despite all the drama, despite all the brilliance of the players, despite the fact that first Messi and then Mbappe blew away the old World Cup scoring record held by Miroslav Klose, the World Cup could not quite outrun the voices in its head warning that something was wrong.
It had started back in December in Washington DC when Infantino, cravenly and cringingly, had awarded President Trump the inaugural FIFA Peace Prize. This was shortly before Trump launched the USA into a series of wars, including one with Iran.
That meant the winner of Infantino’s Peace Prize had provoked a situation where, for the first time, a World Cup host was at war with one of the participants.
The quality of the football was as good as I can remember at a World Cup. Some of the matches that this tournament delivered were all-time classics, such as England’s win in Mexico
Cape Verde threatened to pull off one of the greatest shocks in World Cup history against Argentina with the goal of the tournament, Sidny Lopes Cabral’s brilliant curling drive
But it was the level of servility involved in Infantino’s relationship with Trump that was concerning and embarrassing.
It raised difficult questions about quite how far Infantino would compromise football in his quest to ingratiate himself with the US president. And how much is football to be a tool of regimes in the future?
In the build-up to the tournament, Iran was told it had to move from its US training base and relocated to Tijuana in Mexico. Restrictions were placed on its movements before and after games.
Whatever the nature of the Iranian regime, it felt clear its football team was being asked to operate under different conditions from everyone else. That was the first sign of the tournament being compromised.
More seriously, it then became obvious that President Trump had intervened to try to overturn a red card shown to USA striker Folarin Balogun during the last-32 win over Bosnia and Herzegovina. We know this because President Trump told us, and seemed rather amused by it.
Multiple FIFA officials had told media outlets the red card could not be appealed but a day before the USA faced Belgium at Lumen Field in Seattle, it emerged that Balogun would be available to play after all. FIFA’s disciplinary committee suspended the sanction and triggered widespread accusations of political interference in the World Cup, which Infantino denied.
Belgium were astounded by the move. UEFA were astounded by the move. Privately, many within FIFA were unnerved by the decision. There was talk of it being a scandal that might lead to Infantino’s hold on his football fiefdom unravelling. He has moved swiftly to head off that threat. Balogun played and the USA lost but the damage had been done.
The Balogun Affair led to accusations of corruption operating in plain sight. The World Cup struggled to regain its legitimacy after that. Once you start to doubt the veracity of what you see, then a sport is severely damaged. Look at what has happened to athletics and to cycling.
The Balogun Affair led to accusations of corruption operating in plain sight. The World Cup struggled to regain its legitimacy after that
It raised difficult questions about quite how far Infantino would compromise football in his quest to ingratiate himself with the US president
After the Balogun Affair, the conspiracy theories multiplied and suddenly they didn’t seem so far-fetched any more. Both Egypt and Switzerland claimed they had been victims of favourable treatment shown towards Argentina, because sponsors were desperate to have Messi in the final.
And when something like the issue with Balogun has happened, it doesn’t seem so outlandish.
So the football was beautiful and the performances of Mbappe, Rodri, Bellingham and Messi were beguiling but for all of that, it felt as if football took a step backwards at this World Cup.
