World Cup 2026

[crazy canuck]

It's going to be a smoky World Cup.

Has there ever been a final cancelled due to weather?

[Baron von Schtinkenbutt]

It might be OK by Sunday due to a shortwave trough that's supposed to come through this weekend.

[Sheilbh]

Keeping it classy as always, Argentinian players. Political messaging is strictly banned by FIFA. I'm sure there'll be dire consequences for lil golden boy Messi's team, right? Right guys?

The Lib Dem leader, Ed Davey, has waded in by noting that in 2024 Rodri and Alvaro Morata were given a one match ban for singing "Gibraltar is Spain" and calling for all Argentine players who were singing "the Malvinas are Argentine" to get a one match ban

I don't personally particularly care - but FIFA do about certain things. So at this World Cup Haiti were made to change their shirt because it was too political and FIFA rigorously enforces stadium bans on anything "political". Currently Palestinian flags, but in the previous two world cups also rainbow anything (hats, flags, armbands etc - I feel like Leon Goretzka and maybe UEFA more broadly ended up in a bit of a row with FIFA over this).

[Josquius]

The Lib Dem leader, Ed Davey, has waded in by noting that in 2024 Rodri and Alvaro Morata were given a one match ban for singing "Gibraltar is Spain" and calling for all Argentine players who were singing "the Malvinas are Argentine" to get a one match ban

Hmm..... I'm torn.
On the one hand it would be nice for Spain to beat Argentina fair and square.
On the other....I do like the idea of defeated England's withered hand reaching out from below the death-ledge to claim a righteous win from beyond the veil.

[celedhring]

They will ban them, but of course the decision will come too late for the final.

Anyway, we'll see what happens on Sunday. On paper, we're a far better team than them, and we're Spanish, so even though we don't have their levels of accomplishment in this area we are no strangers to diving and gamemanship

But it's somewhat eerie how they have managed to get here despite being just an ancient Messi + 10 average players. It has that whiff of inevitability that always scares me.

[Richard Hakluyt]

Before the WC started I checked the odds and Argentina were 9-1 to win. I thought these were generous odds and nearly put a substantial bet on; but I'm not a gambler so didn't. It is therefore crucial for Spain to win the final ....viva Espana etc etc 

[Syt]

Before the WC started I checked the odds and Argentina were 9-1 to win. I thought these were generous odds and nearly put a substantial bet on; but I'm not a gambler so didn't. It is therefore crucial for Spain to win the final ....viva Espana etc etc 

[Sheilbh]

Anyway, we'll see what happens on Sunday. On paper, we're a far better team than them, and we're Spanish, so even though we don't have their levels of accomplishment in this area we are no strangers to diving and gamemanship

But it's somewhat eerie how they have managed to get here despite being just an ancient Messi + 10 average players. It has that whiff of inevitability that always scares me.

Yeah and the same last time - remember the first loss against Saudi. Then this time Argentina have not been in the lead at the 90th minute of any of their knock-out games but on they go.

There were tactical mistakes by Tuchel, I think there are still questions for all the good work Southgate of the players' mentality in the really big games/game management (bit of an interesting sort of row about this with Tuchel). Argentina were not at their best for 60 minutes and then ferocious for 30, while England were competent for 60 and cowards for 30. And yet, and yet there is just a sort of force or will from this Argentine team - which, again, was present in 2022 too.

I quite liked this Rory Smith piece on Argentina's "magic" in a World Cup:
https://observer.co.uk/news/sport/article/england-get-caught-in-argentinas-spell

Over the last four years, I have seen Argentina play, in the flesh, seven World Cup games. I was at Lusail when they lost to Saudi Arabia in 2022, a day that ended with Messi trudging from the field, disconsolate, seemingly condemned to yet another humiliation on the stage he values more than any other.

I was back when they beat Mexico, a week or so later, to keep their hopes alive. I saw them beat Australia in the last 16 and the extraordinary thriller with the Netherlands in the quarter final and the surprisingly breezy win against Croatia in the semi. And, of course, there was the final itself, a game that Argentina won three times, an evening that should very clearly go down as the greatest game of them all, football in its highest form.

And then, this time around, I was in Kansas City for Messi's hat-trick against Algeria, and in Atlanta to watch his floods of tears after coming so close to falling to Egypt, and then back again to see him – just a year shy of his forties – make his debut against England. He had, he said, played almost everyone else. It was obviously their turn.

What has been inescapable, throughout it all, is the sense that it does not really matter how good Argentina are; or, at least, how good they are in the dictionary definition of the term, how good they are in the way that we judge other teams. This is because their defining characteristic is a belief in their ultimate destiny that is so absolute that it is, after a while, contagious.

[Norgy]

I suppose I have to choose cholera over bubonic plague. Me llamo Norgy, Viva fucking Espana, except that midget caudillo and his supporters.

[The Minsky Moment]

Worth it to see Trump have to hand the Cup over to those "bad people"

[Duque de Bragança]

Trump will keep the World Cup for himself so Gianni will have to commission a new trophy for the Hispanics, as with the FIFA Club World Cup.

[Norgy]

The World Empanada Champions. Huzzah!

[Threviel]

Worth it to see Trump have to hand the Cup over to those "bad people"

Didn't think of that. Go Spain!