An England sporting side are in a World Cup semi-final on Thursday in London. Its obviously not the men’s football side (yet) and its certainly not the men’s cricket team. Rather England women face South Africa’s women at Lords..
The Men’s Football World Cup kicked off in Mexico City on 11th June. Mexico beat South Africa. The game was unremarkable aside from three red cards but the atmosphere was fitting for such an occasion. It was however, as not reported on ITV, for the few not the many. Standard tickets cost £750 which is the average monthly wage in Mexico.
The tournament might well be a lot better if it had been played in Mexico and Canada only but as it is the majority of the 104 games will be played in the US. Since Trump has never heard of sports washing who knows if it will manage to get to the Final.
As the Round of 32 has been reached its become clear that there are two World Cups. Trump has stayed away so far. Harassment of players and officials, Iran being a prime example, has been a deplorable feature. On the other hand as Simon Kuper argues in the Financial Times (27th June) there is also a fan led World Cup, with supporters of teams in the stadiums- Scotland being an obvious UK focused example- but also with watch parties and big screens.
The Men’s Football World Cup is of course a global event with a global audience and wall to wall media coverage.
Meanwhile another World Cup is reaching its concllusion as England Women beat the current holders New Zealand at The Oval on 27th June as part of the T20 series that will end with a Final at Lords on July 5th. There was a capacity 21,018 crowd despite the fact that England Men were playing in the football World Cup on the same evening.
Media coverage is of course minimal. The Times manages a column by Elizabeth Ammon.
Yet the tournament has a global reach with India playing Pakistan a game which usually attracts the biggest screen based global audience of any sport.
The whole thing is screened on Sky and on ICC.TV and radio commentary is on Radio 5 via Test Match Special.
A World Cup without the machismo
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