The celebrations in Buenos Aires this week were spectacularly loud and life affirming. It felt like every man, woman and child came out to welcome the Jules Rimet trophy back to Argentina after 36 years. Argentina has a politics and an economy that make the UK’s look calm and stable – conspiracies, assassination attempts, corruption and near 90% inflation. But they also have Lionel Messi, probably the most unique, magical and entrancing player of our generation.
The World Cup final was a fitting end to a glorious tournament – on the pitch at least. For aficionados, the final was the most wonderfully rhythmic of games, one that started slowly (at near walking pace for France), but which unfolded into a classic, shaped by individual courage and resolve and glorious technique and skill.
Last week I gave the annual Political Studies Association lecture, “Back of the Net: How Sporting and Political Goals Collide and Contradict” – an appropriate title for an appropriate time. Fifa had always banked on a good tournament on the pitch to, at least partially, distract attention away from the swathe of negativity around Qatar, especially its record on human and workers’ rights.
