What is World Cup all about?
Posted: 2006-07-03 14:09
Here's a cynic's take on what World Cup means for various people.
For the players, it is a pageantry, an auction for potential buyers (ie, rich and prestigious European football clubs) who are scouting for new blood for the next 4 seasons. Players are motivated to present their maximum skills and crowd charisma and to convince buyers to snap themselves up with a handsome salary and a chance to get out of the professional football dump in Africa, Asia, and possibly Latin American countries. Fight on, young and ambitious ones! Older players want to show their bosses that they still got it and "please don't cut my salary and dump me on some secondary or lower club in the armpit of the football world."
For the football clubs, it is a trading ground, not unlike the Toronto or Sundance film festivals, where deals are struck and contracts exchange hands. It's time to pick up hopeful, appealing new players, 3rd world players who are a bargain, and stars who may bring more audience to the club; meanwhile it is also a time to unload a few overpriced, overpaid, overexposed old faces onto someone else. It is a time for clubs to shuffle their cards and maximize potential profit for the next 4 years.
For FIFA, it is a time of publicity and maximum exposure for the organization, a time to renegotiate power among leading forces and re-evaluate the direction of the sport so that it continues to draw more audience and not lose them. It is also time to reap unimaginable amount of profit for televised broadcast all over the world. It is a time to lead and enjoy the glory.
For coaches, it is time to shop around for the next job, and the performance of their own teams is the job application they submit to potential employers.
For media groups, it is time for explosive ratings (television networks), huge profits from advertisements (ie, huge expense and bidding war for Addidas, Nike, etc.), huge number of reporters and pundits. No need to worry about other news coverage for a while...
For fans, it's a time to ditch work, stay up at night, bond with buddies and strangers, laugh, cry, sing, dance, drink, get pissed, piss in the streets, get into brawls, abandon all the mundane routines in life and PARTY! To release all inhibitions and worries, to feel a part of something big -- be it the sport, the David Beckham fan club, the country, whatever.
For the players, it is a pageantry, an auction for potential buyers (ie, rich and prestigious European football clubs) who are scouting for new blood for the next 4 seasons. Players are motivated to present their maximum skills and crowd charisma and to convince buyers to snap themselves up with a handsome salary and a chance to get out of the professional football dump in Africa, Asia, and possibly Latin American countries. Fight on, young and ambitious ones! Older players want to show their bosses that they still got it and "please don't cut my salary and dump me on some secondary or lower club in the armpit of the football world."
For the football clubs, it is a trading ground, not unlike the Toronto or Sundance film festivals, where deals are struck and contracts exchange hands. It's time to pick up hopeful, appealing new players, 3rd world players who are a bargain, and stars who may bring more audience to the club; meanwhile it is also a time to unload a few overpriced, overpaid, overexposed old faces onto someone else. It is a time for clubs to shuffle their cards and maximize potential profit for the next 4 years.
For FIFA, it is a time of publicity and maximum exposure for the organization, a time to renegotiate power among leading forces and re-evaluate the direction of the sport so that it continues to draw more audience and not lose them. It is also time to reap unimaginable amount of profit for televised broadcast all over the world. It is a time to lead and enjoy the glory.
For coaches, it is time to shop around for the next job, and the performance of their own teams is the job application they submit to potential employers.
For media groups, it is time for explosive ratings (television networks), huge profits from advertisements (ie, huge expense and bidding war for Addidas, Nike, etc.), huge number of reporters and pundits. No need to worry about other news coverage for a while...
For fans, it's a time to ditch work, stay up at night, bond with buddies and strangers, laugh, cry, sing, dance, drink, get pissed, piss in the streets, get into brawls, abandon all the mundane routines in life and PARTY! To release all inhibitions and worries, to feel a part of something big -- be it the sport, the David Beckham fan club, the country, whatever.
) and project their own emotions and sentiments onto these young men or boys. Perhaps its an outlet for maternal instinct. 
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