WORLD CUP KICKS AND PICKS
All you need to know about the tournament but never thought about asking
It’s World Cup time again — time for those remaining North Americans who do not yet dress their children in FC Barcelona jerseys to become overnight experts on a subject that will sneak its way into even the least athletic conversations in the coming month. For a crash course on the crazy haircuts, celebrity girlfriends and, yes, actual soccer, for this World Cup, which begins in Russia on June 14, we spoke to Roger Bennett, the Liverpoolbred New Yorker who is a host of Men in Blazers, the irreverent soccer site, podcast and TV show:
The World Cup is the ultimate stage for an emergent global superstar. Who is this year’s most likely candidate?
The game’s breakout star is the young Egyptian Mohamed Salah, who plays the game with the ebullience of an Ewok. The Liverpool striker has just been anointed the Premier League’s player of the year, and the public displays of his Muslim faith that he brings to the field have transcended football. He has become an icon throughout the Middle East, and a one-man bulwark against rising European Islamophobia. His race to return from a dislocated shoulder has the continent of Africa on tenterhooks. They will need the man for whom Liverpool fans have composed the following anthem, to greet every goal he scores: “If he’s good enough for you, he’s good enough for me, if he scores another few, then I’ll be Muslim too.”
David Beckham and Cristiano Ronaldo have leveraged World Cup exposure to establish themselves as sex symbols. Who’s this year’s hunk?
There is only one Ronaldo, a supremely gifted player, yet one so self-obsessed that he only seems to score so he can take his shirt off and expose his eight-pack to the world. A more nuanced hypebeast is Antoine Griezmann. He is a French striker who catches the eye with dashing streetwear and goal celebrations that echo Drake dance moves, not to his mention chameleonic looks, which flick between “clean cut” to “dyed-blonde Justin Bieber-onthree-day-bender.”
Hairstyles are always a part of the fun. Who is this year’s breakout tonsorial star?
The current champion is France’s Paul Pogba. He uses his hair to express his mood, shaving in a new design and unfurling a new hair colour every game to guarantee he will rack up even more likes on social media than goals and assists on the field. Even so, I am a firm believer that here are only six kinds of soccer haircuts, and David Beckham has already invented all of them.
A number of prominent teams failed to qualify. Who will be missed the most?
Chile will be missed, if only for the sheer number of creative neck tattoos they bring to the party. The Netherlands stunning orange jerseys are irreplaceable. Above all, I rue Italy having a rare damp squib of a World Cup qualification campaign. A World Cup without them feels like The Office once Steve Carell quit.
Which perennial power is most likely to disappoint?
Argentina is packed with elite talent, with Lionel Messi their crown jewel. The five-footseven Barcelona star may look like he has just wandered out of Supercuts on Las Ramblas, but his superhuman touch and acceleration have made him one of the greatest ever to play the game. Messi is Argentina’s greatest strength, but Messi overreliance is their biggest weakness. Their biggest players defer to Lionel like Cavaliers players seeking comfort in LeBron James’s shadow.
Is this the year that the evertalented England squad finally avoids humiliation?
Ah, England. Every four years, they arrive at the World Cup hoping for “Land of Hope and Glory,” only to limp away, painfully aware of the fall of their Empire. The one thing England remains world-class at is tabloid media. As a result, English players are guaranteed to play with fear. Uruguayan or Egyptian players run through walls when they pull on their national team jerseys. The English shrink, as if those jerseys are made of chain mail.
Who is this year’s most exciting squad?
Belgium, that flat land of wonder, home to such avant-garde minds as Adolphe Sax, inventor of the saxophone. Somehow that nation of 11 million people has produced a golden generation of elite, attacking footballers. It is a murderers’ row of Premier League talent, and if they can take advantage of their many guns, they might be the most victorious Belgians since Jean-Claude Van Damme won a Golden Raspberry for his role in Double Team.
Which country has the most boring team?
Germany. The defending champions are boring only because they rob football of its beauty, which is its unpredictability. When Germany take the field, they are ruthless, consistent, and always glorious — like Meryl Streep at the Oscars.