Some felt uneasy given Russian soccer’s poor track record of combating racism; others pointed to the persecution of the gay community, both in national law and specifically in certain states, most notably Chechnya. Calls to strip Russia of a World Cup it most likely did not win through an entirely clean process were rare. The sense of moral ambiguity over the tournament’s being held here was much more widespread.

That was not the only similarity. Just as the Soviet authorities had hoped the 1980 Olympics would demonstrate the success of the great Marxist-Leninist experiment to the world, so Vladimir V. Putin, the Russian president, saw the World Cup as the perfect stage on which to show off the modern, dynamic Russia. It would, he promised back when Russia was announced as host in 2010, change the way the planet saw his nation. It was the same promise that accompanied the 2014 Sochi Olympics, awarded in 2007.

Traveling around Russia these last few weeks — from St. Petersburg to Siberia and all points in between — that perception has been the primary concern of most Russians.

FIFA estimated that more than a million fans descended on the country in the past month. In every host city, the first questions most of them were asked were how much they liked Russia, whether they were having a good time, whether they had been treated well. People are eager for what they see as the negative image of the country created by the Western news media to be corrected.

FIFA, certainly, believes its showpiece tournament has done just that, in a way that the facade created by the Soviet authorities in 1980 could not.

“Everyone has discovered a beautiful country, a welcoming country, full of people who are keen to show to the world that what maybe is sometimes said is not what happens here,” FIFA’s president, Gianni Infantino, said. Putin himself said he was “thrilled that our guests saw everything with their eyes, and that myths and prejudice collapsed.”