A Hispanic final

It seems that the language of the World Cup final will be Spanish. It’s going to be Spain versus Argentina. Spain is still home to the Rea; Academia Espanola, the body modeled on the Académie Française, which is dedicated to producing a dictionary of the language, but which is responsible for standardizing the language in the entire Hispanophone world.

Argentina has won three times. And is looking to retain the Cup, something last done by the Brazilian team in 1962. Spain wants to win a second time. I’m not taking anything away from Argentina, but it may be they’ve already played the final, when they beat France in the semi-final. France was widely touted throughout the tournament as the team most likely to win.

In fact, I’ve never seen a team so widely expected to win, except the West Indies cricket team at the 1979 World Cup. Though they had a couple of tough matches, like the one against Pakistan, their win in the final was virtually a formality. Anyhow, the reader will probably be in a better position to judge, because the final will be played after these notes are written, but before they are read by you, gentle reader. But the way France exited made me think that the Mumbai Match-fixers are probably in action.

The presence of US President Donald trump at the final also made me suspect that the bookies have taken over, for the way he got FIFA to let a US player play even after getting a red card showed that he had skin in the game. I wonder what exposure he has for the final. Is he going to spend on Argentina, even though they are a source of migrants, or on Spain, which is the source? I think he’ll settle for whoever has been decided upon by the bookies.

As far as I can remember, there are only two other World Cups the USA is yet to host: the Cricket World Cup and the Rugby World Cup. And the T20 Cricket World Cup, which was their previous World Cup experience, the USA didn’t host the final. But perhaps the USA should wonder why their own sports don’t have World Cups, not having spread to the rest of the world.

Take football. American football is 11-a-side, like soccer, but you carry the ball, like rugby. Let’s npt throw in Australian-rules football, which is 18-a-side, and in which you carry the ball roo.

Football, whether soccer, rugby or American, all originate in that mess when whole English villages would play each other, and you could fight, bite or otherwise gain possession of the ball, and send it into a goal. The distance between goals was the distance between the two villages, and the village dogs were allowed to play. Broken bones were part of the fun.

Somehow, I can imagine President Trump as very happy in that sort of match. Oh yes, there was never a draw, and all matches were played until one side scored, upon which the match ended. I wonder if the rugby tradition of a post-match sing-along, complete with bawdy jokes, had anything to do with this. Again, something Trump would be at home in. But I doubt if he will like the final: too many Hispanics around.