Funnycontrol: (Foot)notes on the (in)glorious (un)certainties of FIFA World Cup (Qatar) 2022

Saudi Arabia beat Argentina, Japan defeated Germany and Morocco have toppled Belgium in FIFA World Cup 2022 matches. (Representational image: Ruben Leija via Unsplash)

Sports is an arena of glorious uncertainties. Especially when the arena is in Qatar. Some of the rules for spectators have been more confounding than trying to understand the off-side rule. Banning alcohol from football matches is like serving green tea at company off-sites after a whole day of boring presentations. You are more likely to see riots over the green tea than between overly drunk senior managers.

Germany and Japan also found themselves on the wrong side of the off-side rules when attempting their first goals. Germany then found itself on the right side of the score line in the first half, but the sudden 2-1 reverse in the second half was as unexpected than the collapse of FTX. Prior to the match, German players had covered their mouths to protest the ban on protesting with OneLove armbands. The move was criticized by German fans after the results saying perhaps the team’s one love should be football.

However, this is after all a Middle East World Cup. So trust the Saudis to pull off an even bigger surprise than the sudden oil production cut by OPEC earlier this year. In a win that was even more unexpected than Elon Musk halting the $8 Bluetick, the Saudis beat former beat World Champions Argentina by a margin of 2-1.

Lionel Messi gave the Argentinians a 10th minute lead from the penalty spot. For the uninformed, Lionel Messi is a Louis Vuitton-sponsored chess player who also plays football in his spare time. Hopefully this addresses the queries of “Who is Messi?” by Saudi Fans after their team reversed the result in the 2nd half with 2 goals. The other chess player sponsored by Loius Vuitton also saw a “Who is Ronaldo?” campaign sponsored by Manchester United. Last heard Apple had shown interest in acquiring Manchester United, so no Steve Jobs fan would ever dare to ask “Who is Tim Cook?”

But the real victory in the Saudi match was the post-match celebrations. The country declared a national holiday after their stupendous victory. A holiday one presumes was equally well celebrated by the immigration construction workers as the local Emirati population. Saudis spontaneously organised dancing circles and waved their country's flag, which included a sword design, from the windows of moving automobiles in Riyadh.  Perhaps seeing an occasional woman driver in the same windows is also a victory worthy of celebration. As per a report in UK-based Express, Saudi Arabia's players will each be gifted a Rolls Royce Phantom by crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud when they return from Qatar. The prince known as MBS is also the titular character in a rendition of “Phantom of the Opera” played at the Saudi embassy in Istanbul in October 2018. His co-star, Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, appeared posthumously.

Qatar lost 3-1 to Senegal in the opening match of the tournament, all but sealing their exit. If Netherlands beat Ecuador, Qatar will see an early exit, making them the first host nation to exit the World Cup without winning a single game. However, in the geopolitical World Cup of 2022, Qatar seems to have won without even firing a single shot because of the skyrocketing prices of natural gas. As both the war in Ukraine and the World Cup progress, we will find out at the end of this year which countries emerge victorious and which ones find themselves on the wrong side of the off-side rule.