Competition World Cup 2026

[William Burroughs]

The format, the qualification, the values behind it - it's just another cash cow in an industry bloated with money and a reflection of everything wrong with society.

Maybe it's because I'm older but I remember being a kid and the int competitions being just incredible - football in the park with mates every day, playing out the games - even 94 when England weren't in it we were engrossed. Not seeing the same vibe for kids nowadays.

I guess with streaming services, internet etc - there is plenty to keep people entertained now.

Click to shrink...

I have the same feeling. For me, and my friends as kids it was the world cups of 98 and 2002. The goals, celebrations and the whole feeling of daily seeing the best players in the world.

But i think the biggest issue is how we are overexposed to football these days. With longer seasons and more and larger competitions there are periods where there is a match every day. There is little, if nothing, special about the world cups these days.

 

[Shadydan]

View: https://x.com/i/status/2064034332734349585

 

[Jenderbazzfass]

Maybe it's because I'm older but I remember being a kid and the int competitions being just incredible - football in the park with mates every day, playing out the games - even 94 when England weren't in it we were engrossed. Not seeing the same vibe for kids nowadays.

Click to shrink...

I am younger than most here and I think the first final I clearly remember was Zidane being sent off in extra time. I am sure I was watching in 2002 or before but I remember being absorbed in the whole tournament in Germany / 2006.

I have the same feeling. For me, and my friends as kids it was the world cups of 98 and 2002. The goals, celebrations and the whole feeling of daily seeing the best players in the world.

But i think the biggest issue is how we are overexposed to football these days. With longer seasons and more and larger competitions there are periods where there is a match every day. There is little, if nothing, special about the world cups these days.

Click to shrink...

I think this touches on the real issue which is that now we can see so much football, and the level of competition in the Champion's League being higher than that of the World Cup makes the latter less interesting.

Even the World Cup itself is overexposed in my opinion, with the expansion adding a lot of really unserious games.

Everything related to football has been diluted to extract the maximum amount of cash and force you to pay attention longer and more intensely and there's only so much excitement a person can muster

 

[Brian Fantana]

Just thinking about the England squad. The fact both madueke and saka are going is just crazy. Neither of them had good seasons. I think tuchel has really mucked up there taking both of them.

 

[Furball man]

Most of the homicides reported in Kansas City happen in an area representing about 10% of the city’s area.

None of the England team will get close to this area and a supporter would have to go out of their way to find themselves there.

The same is true of just about all US cities — violent crimes occur in very small areas. MOST of us urban-dwellers / suburbanites are completely unaffected by gun violence but I would encourage tourists like Spaniel who obviously live in fear to wear bullet-proof vests.

Click to shrink...

America has had 170 mass shootings ( 4 or more people shot ) so far this year . They don’t really keep records for individual shootings but it’s around 100 per day

I’ve been over there plenty of times & love it but those stats are fucking insane

 

[dudu]

I have the same feeling. For me, and my friends as kids it was the world cups of 98 and 2002. The goals, celebrations and the whole feeling of daily seeing the best players in the world.

But i think the biggest issue is how we are overexposed to football these days. With longer seasons and more and larger competitions there are periods where there is a match every day. There is little, if nothing, special about the world cups these days.

Click to shrink...

There is some of that to a degree -

But I have gotten older the spectacle has become so sanitised and lost its special flavour too -

World Cups in Russia, Qatar and US are simply events to sportswash and all the vibes and carnival atmosphere has been completely stripped of the whole event for me -

Now with the actual football likely to be much more boring in the group stages due to the format change - I truly believe this event is no longer for the fans - or at least any attempt to try and make us believe it is, has gone out