Everything but the soccer: Why World Cup hype has been drowned out before kickoff

It is worth asking, first, what a World Cup should be about. Ask any athlete, and the answer will usually come back to the same place: football. This is a chance to perform at the highest level of the sport, against the best possible competition, with the rest of the world watching. There is nothing else that can replicate that.

“I’ve always wanted to play at the highest possible level," Brazil's Raphinha told GOAL in April. "That level… demands a tremendous amount from a person. It’s something I’ve been preparing for since childhood."

Athletes are competitive people. There is a sense of validation here, perhaps even of proving something to the rest of the world. It’s about saying: I belong.

World Cups are also about national pride. There are images that last long in the memory, and plenty from more recent years. There was the nation of Argentina willing Lionel Messi to a World Cup triumph in 2022. That same tournament, there were tears from Neymar as Brazil were bounced by Croatia.

For the fans, it changes. For some, yes, it is about their country, and a genuine love of where they’re from. For others, it’s about having something to rally around, and the fun of expectation. Curacao, who qualified this year, are pretty much just happy to be here.

“Whatever happens, we're going to celebrate. If we have a corner, we're going to celebrate. A red card, a yellow card, the first penalty, the offside. We're going to celebrate everything and enjoy the tournament,” said Brenton Balentien, the leader of Curacao’s most prominent fan group.

There is also an element of travel, of journey, of being able to see something and experience a place. A country calls, and fans will flock. It’s a pretty good excuse for a holiday - with some sport sprinkled in.

And with those tenets in mind, narratives are easily constructed. There isn’t really such a thing as a “good” or a “bad” World Cup before it begins. These things are about stories, and the legacies that follow. Of course, those are impossible to tell before a ball is kicked. But right now, it’s hard to find genuine, pure, unfiltered excitement for the weeks to come.

Jim McCarthy thinks FIFA got this wrong from the start. The ticketing expert has seen how soccer is sold correctly. He’s also seen how it’s been done very, very wrong. This is certainly closer to the latter.

The raw data looks bad here. Ticket prices have fluctuated since they were first made available at the end of last year. But as of earlier this week, the average price for a group-stage game on the resale market was $550. They max out, for the initial round, north of $2,000.

"Let's say you want to maximize the revenue of an event. The game is to find that absolutely optimal price point where the demand and the supply meet. That's the best you can do. Because if you go past that, then people begin to drop out of the market," McCarthy explained to GOAL.

Now, it is worth noting that North America is a very different place from, say, Qatar. But astronomical ticket prices have, of course, priced out many local fans. The notion that football is a democracy is, in all honesty, fairly outdated at this point. The World Cup, in particular, is far more corporate than it used to be. And yes, in America, things tend to be more expensive.

But simply blaming this all on “capitalism” and saying, as Gianni Infantino pointed out last month, that Americans are simply “willing” to pay more to see events, is a bit narrow - especially when you consider that the United States is just one of 48 teams playing in the tournament. Sure, there will be plenty of USMNT fans who have paid high prices for friendlies, other soccer matches, or even the 2024 Copa America. But they are still in the minority, and very few would have had to pay prices quite like these.

The line from FIFA is that ticket sales are at an all-time high, and that they have eclipsed the numbers from 1994. And it is true that this will be the most well-attended World Cup ever. But there are also 104 games across 16 cities. The smallest stadium, BMO Field in Toronto, seats 45,000. The average capacity is 65,000. There are a lot of seats to fill, and a lot of content to consume. Of course, the raw data was always going to go one way.

And FIFA, no doubt, can hang its hat on that. The extent of its role in city-by-city planning can, and should, be questioned. But it has put the right pieces in the right places to ensure there are a lot of available seats. Filling them, at the right price, though, has been anything but simple.

Then there is the question of who, exactly, can watch this thing. There are roughly 350 million people who live in the United States. Many will want to go to a World Cup game. But World Cups are also about the blending of cultures, an excuse for fans from other countries to follow their team around.

This has never been a cheap venture. The issue is that teams hop from venue to venue over the course of a tournament, starting in the group stage. England are a typical example here. They play their first game in Dallas, their second in New Jersey, and their third in Boston. A study from the BBC estimated that, at the absolute minimum, it would take roughly £6,000 ($8,000) for a fan to travel to all three group games, assuming that a thrifty supporter would be willing to take a connecting flight out of London to Dallas.

And that doesn’t even factor in the chaos associated with tourist visas. International fans are required to obtain travel authorization. Most applications are approved, and all reports indicate that those who have tickets - and can prove it - tend to have their submissions expedited. Until May 19, fans from certain countries also had to post visa bonds of up to $15,000.

There are also some uncomfortable political realities around this tournament. Fans from four qualified countries currently face legal barriers to traveling to the United States, and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement announced on May 19 that it will play a “pivotal role” in World Cup security. Given the broader national debate around immigration, it is likely to be a sensitive issue in several host cities. The U.S. is, at the moment, a tense place to host a global event.

It’s also a tough one to get around. This was always going to be a reality. America is large, and its public transportation, in some places, is woefully lacking. Fans of most teams will have to fly from game to game in order to follow their country around.

But perhaps more prescient are the difficulties that host committees and cities themselves are facing. Unlike in European countries - and many around the world - American stadiums are not typically bedded into cities. Many are miles away, with little apparent public transportation.

Some cities have reacted admirably. Kansas City, which will host six matches, invested in bus transportation early on. Stadium shuttles will cost $15 - and are only available for those with tickets. Philadelphia and Atlanta have also made efforts. Trains to Lincoln Financial Field cost $2.90. Atlanta’s Mercedes-Benz Stadium is pretty naturally accessible.

And then, there are the tricky ones. Perhaps the most difficult journey in the tournament is that from New York’s Penn Station to MetLife Stadium in New Jersey. That it involves a train switch to the NJ Transit is irritating enough. But the prices have become astronomical. First, it was announced that a train ticket by train to the stadium would set back fans $150 (they’re usually $13). After sponsors got involved, the price was lowered to a more palatable but by no means pleasant $98. Boston isn’t much better, with a round-trip ticket from Boston South Station to Foxboro Station costing $80.

This all runs in stark contrast to the relatively affordable nature of previous World Cups. Public transportation was free in Qatar - as long as supporters used a special Fan ID app. Russia is a more alike case study due to its size, but even they offered trains free of charge.

Of course, the uncomfortable truth here is that America doesn’t have that much connectivity between cities. It is difficult, for example, to get from Dallas to Boston without getting on a plane, as driving would take at least 27 hours.

And that brings us, finally, to the question of blame. It has been easy to point a finger at FIFA, and the governing body certainly bears responsibility for some of the issues at play.

Host committees told GOAL a year ago that they were still trying to work through key questions, with limited guidance from football’s central governing body. In subsequent conversations over the following months, that picture has not changed all that much. FIFA’s approach to pricing, led by Gianni Infantino, has hardly helped.

And, of course, there are the politics. The U.S. government’s immigration policies have created uncertainty for some traveling supporters, including those coming for a short-term visit to watch football. There is also blame to be shared by host committees, which have looked to maximize revenue in their own ways.

The broader issue here - and the real frustration - is that all of this has become so central to the conversation. Every World Cup comes with complications beyond the field. Qatar was surrounded by serious human rights concerns. Brazil had questions around policing and public unrest. Russia’s hosting of the 2018 tournament was heavily scrutinized, too.

But in each case, those concerns were eventually met by the momentum of the tournament itself. Now, though, at least in the States, there has been relatively little discussion about the actual soccer. Attention spans are shorter than ever, and media cycles move quickly. Yet so many of the conversations around this World Cup remain focused on issues outside the lines, rather than the 90 minutes.

There is also the fact that this is a World Cup hosted by three nations. Mexico has political challenges of its own. But neither Mexico nor Canada seems to come up in the discourse nearly as much.

There is an element of journalistic duty here - to get incredibly meta. Storylines have to be formed. Takes have to be fired off. Genuine, solid, fair reporting is a pillar of any major sporting event. Yet World Cups should be about the football, the experiences and, most of all, the fun. Where is that now? Perhaps buried beneath all the things that keep getting in the way.