The first World Cup kicks off with Qatar-Ecuador in the desert, the first in winter, the most controversial one,
torn apart by controversies and accusations of corruption, in a Qatar that has built its stadiums while rebuilding all the structures of the country over time of records.
But at the price of a job bordering on slavery, underpaid, without rights for immigrant workers who are 3 times more numerous than Qataris.
And without openings to the human and civil rights of the population.
On the eve of the head of world football, the president of Fifa, Gianni Infantino, proclaimed that today he feels "Arab, gay and migrant".
It will be the hunt for the title of champion France, with Argentina and Brazil contending Les Bleus for the role of favourites, and Cristiano Ronaldo at the farewell step as well as Leo Messi.
while Italy remains to watch.
Almost 35 degrees outside, artificial cold indoors thanks to air conditioning extended for the first time to stadiums, grandstands and lawns.
This too is a violation, this time of the by now universally dictated norms of ecological sustainability, almost a disfigurement of the "politically correct" of a host country forced to build 8 stadiums in Doha, a single city which is also the only one in its territory, as large as the Abruzzo.
Second consecutive World Cup - after that of 4 years ago in Russia - with Italy not qualified, third overall considering also the 1958 one in Sweden.
It is the fourth absence of the blue from the top world competition if we consider the first edition of 1930 in Uruguay, in which Italy chose not to participate in protest for not having been chosen as the organizing country.
Rights of workers, women, immigrants, the LGBTQ+ world, dissent and minority rights, the fight against injustices and for democracy have so far ousted sports headlines from the front pages.
From today, these facts - often very serious accusations such as that of the associations which accuse 6,500 deaths at work in these 12 years of ignored rights in Qatar - will have to coexist with the football played.
In other editions, the battles of the opponents, of the minorities, dissolved at the first kick-off of the tournament.
This time, civil struggles, for justice, for rights, will not dissolve and football will have to learn to live with it.
German goalkeeper and captain Manuel Neuer, for example, has confirmed he will wear the 'One Love' armband to promote diversity and inclusion in Qatar.
And he will settle between the posts "without fear", because his Federation supports him, despite Fifa has not done so, even saying it is against t-shirts and displays of belonging to civil battles on the pitch.
But it will not be only the hashtag #boycottQatar that will stand out among the protests, the dramas of the participating countries will also draw the attention of the world of sport, starting from Monday when the teams of England and Iran will take the field for the second day.
The reserve goalkeeper and forward of the Iranian team, Hossein Hosseini and Vahid Amiri expressed today "
The challenge on a sporting level appears in this rather open edition, with several of the teams present in this latest edition of 32 participants able to challenge the reigning champions of France.
Hopes that gained strength after the numerous forfeits of Les Bleus, starting with those of Pogba and Kanté.
It is Leo Messi's last World Cup, who at the age of 35 dreams of joining his compatriot Diego Maradona in the Olympus of legends, winning a World Cup that has already eluded him 4 times.
His neighbor of more than a decade of challenges for the Ballon d'Or, Cristiano Ronaldo, arrives saddened by the decline and the final controversies with his club, Manchester, and looking for an unlikely final blow with his Portugal .
Together with the teams of the two champions who have dominated this part of the century,
they seem able to give battle to an England that usually betrays the expectations and the renewed Spain and Germany, with the Holland of the never tame Louis van Gaal on the bench.
There is also expectation to understand who the fans will be in the stands of the stadiums in the desert: cheering local stunt doubles with photocopied shirts or real fans who will disembark from their own countries despite the stellar costs of this adventure?
For now, only the presence of super VIP fans is certain who, at the end of the matches, will go back to sleep - with special planes - in the multi-starred hotels of nearby Dubai.
(HANDLE).
is waiting also to understand who will be the fans in the stands of the stadiums in the desert: cheering local stunt doubles with photocopied shirts or real fans who will disembark from their own countries despite the stellar costs of this adventure?
For now, only the presence of super VIP fans is certain who, at the end of the matches, will go back to sleep - with special planes - in the multi-starred hotels of nearby Dubai.
(HANDLE).
is waiting also to understand who will be the fans in the stands of the stadiums in the desert: cheering local stunt doubles with photocopied shirts or real fans who will disembark from their own countries despite the stellar costs of this adventure?
For now, only the presence of super VIP fans is certain who, at the end of the matches, will go back to sleep - with special planes - in the multi-starred hotels of nearby Dubai.
(HANDLE).
