A complicated competition

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 17/11/2022 (1363 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Earlier this week, FIFA president Gianni Infantino addressed the intergovernmental forum at the G20 Summit in Indonesia — at a luxurious Nusa Dua hotel.

Minutes earlier he’d been photographed glad-handing with Justin Trudeau and Rishi Sunak, the Canadian and British prime ministers, respectively.

“Football is a force for good,” Infantino said. “Because football unites the world, this particular FIFA World Cup, with five billion people watching it, can be a trigger for a positive gesture, for a sign or a message of hope.”

His use of “trigger” was either an accident or a strange attempt at wordplay, because the point of his speech — albeit a secondary one — was to suggest a Russia-Ukraine ceasefire for the duration of the upcoming World Cup in Qatar. That he made no differentiation between the invader and the invaded was hardly surprising.

FIFA, the body that governs world football, engages in politics only so far as it’s convenient to do so. A working lunch with world leaders overlooking the Indian Ocean? Sign them up. Human Rights Watch describing the conflict as a full-scale Russian invasion that has “caused civilian deaths and injuries, and damage to civilian buildings, including hospitals, schools and homes?” There’s an Infantino-shaped hole in the door.

HRW, incidentally, has also labelled FIFA a “complacent enabler” of the mistreatment of workers in World Cup-host Qatar, abuse that’s included “illegal recruitment fees, wage theft, injuries and deaths.” The International Labour Organization says 50 foreign workers died building World Cup infrastructure: tens of thousands sustained injuries.

Naturally, Infantino wasn’t in Bali to discuss Qatar. No, he had something to sell — namely, a FIFA campaign referenced craftily in his remarks: Football Unites the World.

Or, when used in its context, a FIFA-Trademark-Ceasefire.

Football festival

The World Cup starts Sunday. We like our World Cups. Whether we’re dedicated supporters with club teams we follow or novice fans indulging our curiosity, or even revellers who simply enjoy the occasion of it all, there’s something magical about the quadrennial football festival.

For the young, it’s the heroes joining forces like in some sort of multiverse, the legends of Santos, Botafogo and Corinthians uniting to vanquish the enemies of Cagliari, Internazionale and Milan. Or maybe it’s a sorcerer’s tale, where the wizard casts spells on giants. Perhaps a spiritual experience, where heaven and earth seem to merge on a football pitch.

For the older, it’s the memories they keep, of Pele, Jairzinho and Rivelino defeating Riva, Boninsegna and Rosato, committed to that 8mm projector of memory, grainy and as fondly recalled as a teenage romance. Or maybe it’s that of Zidane, enchanting the observer and the reigning world champions on a warm July night in Saint-Denis. Perhaps it’s that moment of divine intervention when the Hand of God helped Maradona and Argentina defeat the English.

It’s really a combination of remembrance and expectation that nudges us enticingly towards that first kick, first goal, first of many moments both to cherish and retain for later. Canadian fans, in particular, will anticipate many firsts at this World Cup. Whichever player scores that initial goal will forever have his name inscribed in the memories of anyone who agonized over, cried over, this team down the years. And a first win? It’s good to dream.

Dreams — remember those? Optimism? A future worth hoping in? For many, peace? If anything, this World Cup is a further disturbance to a world off-balance.

The World Cup starts Sunday. It probably shouldn’t. But somehow, some way, included in the upheaval we’ll inevitably associate with the present, there will also be the better recollections we’ll have of Christian Eriksen, back from a heart attack and starring for Denmark; of Son Heung-min, recovering from eye surgery in time to inspire South Korea; of Sardar Azmoun, risking a regime’s wrath by supporting the women and girls of Iran; and of Alphonso Davies, the refugee who became a Canadian icon.

Yes, football can be a force for good — through people who demonstrate goodness.

Body count

The 2022 FIFA World Cup is also an exercise in body count.

Due to its timing, the tournament has already claimed a number of high-profile internationals, among them N’Golo Kante, Paul Pogba, Timo Werder, Marco Reus, Diogo Jota, Giovani Lo Celso, Reece James …the list goes on. Canadians Scott Kennedy, Doneil Henry and Maxime Crepeau will also miss out.

But those bodies have names. There are countless others that don’t, not beyond their immediate families anyway, and before a ball is kicked it behooves us to make the morbid tally.

We’ll never know the full human cost of Qatar’s World Cup. Denial and dishonesty have seen to that, and the rigorously-compiled numbers of various outlets are necessarily piecemeal and time-specific.

We do know, thanks to the International Labour Organization, that 50 foreign workers perished on World Cup-specific projects in 2021 alone — a year that also saw 500 serious injuries and nearly 40,000 others categorized from mild to moderate. Also in 2021, The Guardian reported that no fewer than 6,500 foreign labourers had died in the country since 2011.

None of this takes into account the lasting cardiac and kidney problems resulting from exertion in extreme heat and humidity while exposed to solar radiation and dust. Inevitably, these gruesome figures will only go up.

FIFA wasn’t a force for good for these men. It was a death sentence.

That pit in the stomach as the World Cup approaches, bringing everything it entails? Sit with it. It should be there.

Welcome to the World Cup of cognitive dissonance.

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