The World Cup is an occasion for joy, wonder, and discovery\u00a0\u2014 of the enthusiasm of fans, of the talents of unheralded squads, of the new prowess known favorites will deploy. But also, it seems, an occasion for many to rediscover the temptations of easy demonization and flat political generalizations. We are thrilled to see our Argentine side show again why f\u00fatbol is the beautiful game, accompanied by polemics from the usual suspects, like the UK Tory press or our traditional rivals in Brazil.<\/p>\n
However, it\u2019s been surprising to see the progressive media across the Anglo-American world take up the most ridiculous and unfounded claims about our country as a whole. All the lazy articles with titles playing on a certain Andrew Lloyd Webber production are definitely a sign. Anglo-American commentary has lost its mind, blending bitter \u201cVAR-gentina\u201d conspiracies with potted claims about race and (in-this-case-only justified) outrage over Argentine president Javier Milei\u2019s fawning relationship with Donald Trump and Bibi Netanyahu.<\/p>\n
Gritting our teeth and bearing it, in this vigil before the final match we dare say a couple of things. Above all, allow yourself to enjoy the game, let the beauty of it all sink in, root for whoever you want. Rewatch Cabo Verde\u2019s Sidny Lopes Cabral score against Argentina until you fall asleep, look for new angles to discover another genius touch in the collective masterpiece ending in Lautaro Mart\u00ednez\u2019s header against England, rejoice in the na\u00eff rowing of the Norwegians, the prodigious talents of Kylian Mbapp\u00e9, the elegance of Mo Salah. Close your eyes and envision the adventures of the many players born in slums and now parading as Greek demigods. But don\u2019t fall for the moralizing, for the flattening of the features of entire nations, for the lecturing of entire fandoms.<\/p>\n
There are three things people should know about football before writing about football. One is how the teams play. Argentina has played an irregular World Cup, but it has also shown some of its best qualities. Though slower than in 2022, it\u2019s still a rather offensive team, with a solid midfield and dynamic wingbacks helping in attack. It creates spaces with a wide variety of strategies, breaking rivals who have built nine-player moats, with Messi playing from the midfield and forward, on the left and right of the field and with forwards that have delivered when needed. It has shown mental and physical toughness. It\u2019s a style that elicits admiration, respect, and fear among pretty much everybody who watches football more than once every four years.<\/p>\n
Another aspect to consider is the communities created around football and the meaning we give to those communities, during the World Cup and throughout our lives. Within the constraints of the capitalist society in which it exists, football is a rather horizontal space of camaraderie. We play and celebrate and watch football, and then endlessly discuss how we played and celebrated and watched. In spite of the oppressive forces of capital crushing football and social life in general, football is, in many respects, a de-commodified space, without ulterior gains beyond the symbolic achievements and the reinforcing sense of belonging to a given community, whether it is a neighborhood club or the national team. More than anything, football is a space in which we happily waste our time. No wonder the places we in Argentina play football as kids (and beyond) are called potreros, the pastures where colts grew in the wild, the empty lots, interstices of the urban space that survive the swallowing power of market forces.<\/p>\n
Yet little of this breaks through to those, on the Right and perhaps more surprisingly on the Left, who simply wish to apply familiar patterns from the Global North to unfamiliar realities from the Global South. Certain progressive tribunes writing about Argentine football read as a tragicomic version of something we have seen before, not trying to understand other realities, but insisting on fitting them into preestablished categories. Thus the theories about an imputed racial makeup of the Argentine team, flat speculations about political connections, and truly remarkable assumptions about the ability of the Argentine government or football elites to coordinate conspiracies.<\/p>\n