Beautiful game, rotten underbelly

South Africa couldn’t afford it. Brazil doesn’t want it. Russia mightn’t be right for it. Qatar shouldn’t have got it.

It’s amidst the rubble of World Cup selection that there was an interesting release at the Cannes Film Festival the other week. Entitled ‘United Passions’, the synopsis says it’s about “a group of passionate European mavericks who join forces on an ambitious project: FIFA. An epic, untold story that brings to life the inspiring saga of the World Cup and the three determined men who created it. Driven by their vision and passion, Jules Rimet, Joao Havelange and Sepp Blatter overcame their doubts and fought obstacles and scandals to make the World Cup a reality…”

At a cost of €16m to football’s governing body and with Tim Roth, Gérard Depardieu and Sam Neill portraying the three main characters, your first thought is does it includes Blatter’s presidency of the World Society of Friends of Suspenders — an organisation which tried to stop women replacing suspender belts with pantyhose. But when you shrug off the amusement and bemusement of it all, nothing gives a better insight into what awaits us here in Brazil. It’s less than a week to kick-off at the latest World Cup but this is the perfect example of how capitalism has stripped the tournament of its soul and ego has stripped the tournament of its meaning. What we are left with is merely a moral void and local indifference to the games themselves as the result.