“Are Colombia any good?”

The question initially catches you off guard, coming from someone whose typical mention of football is limited to “Oh, are you watching it again?”. You wonder if it’s a trick, an attempt to lure you into some unforeseen mistake. And then, just as the look of confusions breaks on your face, the initial question is repeated. This time it is succeeded by six words that immediately provide clarity.

“Are Colombia any good? I got them in the sweepstake.”

“Will Kane score tonight?” you are asked by Carol from accounts. “Gotta fancy Germany, haven’t you?” says Nigel the IT manager, who you’re pretty sure you haven’t spoken to once since the quiet word about internet usage at work in Ferbuary. You bond with him by making the exactly the same face at one another, one that somehow conveys “course you have; bloody Germany” with a raising of the eyebrows and wry smile. Bloody Germany.

Therein lies the World Cup’s biggest success. Not in persuading those of us who already hoover up football via a dozen different mediums to watch matches every day, for that is as easy as taking sweets from a baby. But in hearing people who would otherwise go out of their way to avoid football suddenly dip their toe into the culture. They are not afflicted by World Cup fever, but you can still hear the occasional sniffle.

It is easy to believe that international football has become subservient to the club game. By all logic, it certainly should have done. The club game is awash with money, subject to 24-hour coverage and has the transfer system as the principal story line in its soap opera. The international game has none.

If club football provides quantity, the quality isn’t bad either. Wealthy foreign investors and engorged broadcasting revenues force financial inequality, so the latter stages of the Champions League effectively become a European Super League. Liverpool were understandably sold as the heartening underdog story of this season’s competition; the failed move for Nabil Fekir stopped them eclipsing £200m in player purchases in 2018 alone, but the delay will only be temporary.

Against such competition, international football should feel like an irrelevance, or at least an irritating sideshow. Such a large part of it is preliminary or preparatory, from friendly matches to regulation qualifiers, that it is too easily ignored next to the hyperama of the domestic game. Lionel Messi and Ronaldo have played each other twice at international level. Since the beginning of 2011, Real Madrid have faced Barcelona 29 times in competitive matches. How can you cope with that?

But it does cope. Hell, it flourishes. The domination of the club game is instead replaced by a general unwritten hierarchy of football, shared by the majority of supporters, if not quite all. In ascending order of importance: 4) International friendlies 3) International qualifiers 2) Club football 1) International tournament football. Major tournaments exist as a refuge from the raging storm of the club game. Gentle patriotism replaces angry tribalism – bask in the bliss.

However many times the club game rolls itself in glitter and books primetime advert slots, it can never truly win. Because somewhere beneath the layers of gold-plating that cover football – and as much as FIFA do their best to hide it – a soul can be found.

Nothing beats the World Cup. Nothing beats the pre-tournament hope, expectation, fear and excitement. Nothing beats the World Cup pullouts. Nothing beats the wallcharts. Nothing beats the hours spent deliberating over picking a winner and top scorer. Nothing beats your local pub putting up flags of all the countries taking part (and plenty who aren’t). Nothing beats the sticker album and the got, got, need. Nothing beats football at lunchtime, not on a grainy betting stream but front and centre on terrestrial television. Nothing beats watching the old videos of World Cups past, making the hairs on your neck stand on end to moments you weren’t even alive to witness. Nothing beats Nessun Dorma. Nothing beats Sir Bobby Robson’s jig, Kenneth Wolstenholme’s commentary or Paul Gascoigne’s tears.

Nothing beats going to bed dreaming of football just gone and waking up thinking about football just coming, an all-you-can-eat buffet where you never get full and the menu keeps changing. At no other time is football on with such regularity and with each game having so much meaning to so many. In every corner of every bar of every city of every country in the world, hopes are extinguished and dreams realised on a repeated loop. This is football in technicolor. For those of us who breathe the sport, it is life in technicolor too.

What’s more, most players think the same. Despite the rise in salaries and potential for celebrity superstardom that the club game provides, winning the World Cup remains the pinnacle. It guarantees a lasting legacy that no amount of league titles or European trophies can match.

The World Cup is a multi-layered event. There are seven or eight countries of the 32 in Russia who could realistically hope to taste victory in the final on July 15, and even then Brazil, Germany, France and Spain have more chance than most. After 2018, 79 nations will have participated in the World Cup – only eight have won it.

But crucially, the skewed depth of talent towards several nations is not done through financial doping, stockpiling of young players or broadcasting revenues. Not all are born equal, but teams at the World Cup compete on merit. In the club game, could Iceland – with their population of 330,000 – hope to compete with Brazil, France and Germany?

Every team at Russia has a human interest story. Can Mohamed Salah recover from injury to lead Egypt? Can Luis Tejada conclude his journeyman story with a World Cup goal for Panama at the age of 36? Can Raheem Sterling complete a redemption in the eyes of the English media? Can Lee Seung-Woo, one of a handful of [insert nationality here] Messis to grace this tournament, cause a shock with South Korea? Everywhere you look, possible salvation and glory can be found. The World Cup is the lifeblood for a thousand different individuals.

Despite all the evidence, it succeeds. The World Cup hosts are steeped in scandal, their president is using the tournament to boost his political prestige and the organising body has been proven to be inherently corrupt. We are warned about organised violence and ticket touting. And yet, amid a sea of bad news stories, we source joy. The more we are told that we must not enjoy the World Cup, the more we use it as our escape.

So sit back in your comfy seats and enjoy the sounds, sights, shots and saves. It will be another four years before Panama vs Tunisia and Serbia vs Costa Rica, or their equivalents, become must-watch sporting events again. This is the greatest show on earth. You’ll only regret it if you miss a minute.

Daniel Storey

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