2018 FIFA World Cup

• 1. Introduction

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  The 2018 FIFA World Cup opened on the 14th of June in Moscow's Luzhniki Stadium, where Russian president Vladimir Putin welcomed the world and called football a uniting force. Thirty-two national teams had gathered across eleven Russian cities, but the road to this moment had been anything but smooth. The country that earned the right to host had been accused of corruption, human rights abuses, doping cover-ups, and the forced labour of workers building the very stadiums the world was about to watch. Yet more than 3 million people attended matches, and an estimated 3.572 billion unique viewers tuned in worldwide. How did a tournament shadowed by so much controversy become what FIFA's own president called the best World Cup ever? And who would walk away with the trophy after one of the most dramatic tournaments in the competition's history?

• 2. The Bid and Its Shadows

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  On the 2nd of December 2010, the 22-member FIFA Executive Committee gathered in Zurich to vote on hosts for both the 2018 and 2022 tournaments. Russia won the 2018 bid in the second round of voting, beating out a joint Portugal-Spain proposal and a Netherlands-Belgium bid. England was eliminated in the first round after receiving just two votes, despite bidding to host its second World Cup.

  The aftermath was immediate and bitter. England's Football Association claimed that four members of the executive committee had requested bribes to vote for England, and that FIFA president Sepp Blatter had indicated before the vote that Russia would win. FIFA appointed US attorney Michael J. Garcia to investigate. Garcia produced a full report, but it was never published publicly. Instead, FIFA released a 42-page summary written by German judge Hans-Joachim Eckert that cleared both Russia and Qatar of wrongdoing. Garcia himself called the summary "materially incomplete" with "erroneous representations of the facts and conclusions". When the appeal committee declined to hear his challenge, Garcia resigned, citing a "lack of leadership" and doubts about Eckert's independence.

  On the 3rd of June 2015, the FBI confirmed that federal authorities were investigating the awarding of both tournaments. That same month, Domenico Scala, the head of FIFA's Audit and Compliance Committee, stated in a published interview that if evidence showed awards had been bought, they could be cancelled. The investigations continued, but Russia kept the hosting rights.

• 3. Building the Stage

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  Russia's preparations came at an estimated cost of over $14.2 billion, making it at the time the most expensive World Cup ever staged, surpassing the $11.6 billion spent on the 2014 tournament in Brazil. The Russian government had originally set aside around $20 billion, later cut to $10 billion. Half of that reduced figure went toward transportation infrastructure alone, including a federal sub-program for transport construction with a total budget of 352.5 billion rubles.

  Twelve stadiums across eleven cities were either built from scratch or substantially renovated. Nine of the twelve were entirely new. The Saint Petersburg Stadium, begun in 2007 on a site formerly occupied by the Kirov Stadium, was not officially completed until the 29th of December 2016. The Samara Arena's construction started on the 21st of July 2014 and finished on the 21st of April 2018, just weeks before the tournament began. Costs in Yekaterinburg alone grew to over 7.4 billion rubles, well above the 5.6 billion originally budgeted from state and regional funds.

  The human cost of construction drew international condemnation. Human Rights Watch documented cases of migrant workers left unpaid, forced to work in dangerously cold conditions, or subjected to reprisals when they raised complaints. In May 2017, FIFA president Gianni Infantino acknowledged that North Korean workers at Saint Petersburg's Zenit Arena had been subjected to human rights abuses. By June 2017, at least 17 workers had died on World Cup construction sites, according to Building and Wood Workers' International. A group of eight US senators wrote to FIFA calling for Russia's hosting rights to be stripped if an independent investigation confirmed allegations of forced labour involving North Korean workers.

• 4. Who Made It, Who Didn't

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  For the first time in World Cup history, all 209 eligible FIFA member associations applied to enter qualifying. Zimbabwe and Indonesia were later disqualified before playing their first matches. Gibraltar and Kosovo, which joined FIFA on the 13th of May 2016, also entered even though the qualifying draw had already taken place.

  Iceland became the smallest country by population ever to reach the World Cup. Panama also made their debut. Egypt returned after an absence stretching back to 1990. Peru came back for the first time since 1982. Three Nordic countries qualified simultaneously for the first time ever: Denmark, Iceland, and Sweden. Four Arab nations qualified together for the first time as well.

  The absences were equally striking. Italy, a four-time champion, failed to qualify for the first time since 1958. The Netherlands missed out for the first time since 2002. The United States did not qualify for the first time since 1986. The defending Copa America champions Chile also failed to make it, for the first time since 2006.

  The qualifying draw itself had been held on the 25th of July 2015 at the Konstantinovsky Palace in Strelna, Saint Petersburg. When the group draw followed on the 1st of December 2017 at the State Kremlin Palace in Moscow, former England striker Gary Lineker served as conductor, assisted by figures including Diego Maradona, Fabio Cannavaro, and Gordon Banks.

• 5. VAR, Records, and Upsets

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  Shortly after the International Football Association Board incorporated video assistant referees into the laws of the game on the 16th of March 2018, FIFA approved VAR's use at a World Cup for the first time. All operations ran from a single headquarters in Moscow, with referees on the field reachable by radio in real time.

  On the 15th of June 2018, Diego Costa scored the first World Cup goal that was the direct result of a VAR decision, doing so against Portugal. The day after, Antoine Griezmann converted the first penalty awarded through VAR, in France's match against Australia. A record number of penalties were awarded across the tournament, a trend widely attributed to the new system. Overall, only four players were sent off during the entire competition, the fewest since 1978. The International Football Association Board's technical director David Elleray suggested that players were more cautious precisely because VAR removed the possibility of getting away with foul play unseen.

  Germany, the defending champions, were eliminated in the group stage for the first time since 1938. No African team reached the second round for the first time since 1982. Japan advanced over Senegal on fair play points, the first time that tiebreaker had ever been used in the competition. And in the quarter-finals, host nation Russia was eliminated, ending a run that had already exceeded expectations for the lowest-ranked team in the draw.

• 6. The Final and Its Awards

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  France met Croatia on the 15th of July at Luzhniki Stadium in Moscow. France won 4-2, claiming the country's second World Cup title. The victory made France the fourth consecutive European champion, after Italy in 2006, Spain in 2010, and Germany in 2014.

  Croatian midfielder Luka Modrić was voted the tournament's best player and received the Golden Ball. England's Harry Kane finished as the top scorer with six goals and took the Golden Boot. Belgium's Thibaut Courtois claimed the Golden Glove for his goalkeeping performances. France's Kylian Mbappé won the FIFA Young Player Award. A Benjamin Pavard goal in the round of 16, scored in the France-Argentina match that finished 2-2 before France went on to win, was voted the Goal of the Tournament.

  Total prize money reached $400 million. Champions France received $38 million. Runners-up Croatia took home $28 million. Teams eliminated in the group stage each received $8 million.

  FIFA announced the champion's prize before the tournament had even begun, releasing the prize money amounts in October 2017, a detail that underlined how far in advance the commercial machinery of the event was already running.

• 7. Spectacle and Symbols

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  The tournament's logo had been unveiled on the 28th of October 2014, revealed by cosmonauts at the International Space Station and then projected onto Moscow's Bolshoi Theatre. Russian Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko said it drew on Russia's artistic tradition and history of bold achievement. The typeface used in the branding, called Dusha, was created by the DSType Foundry in Portugal.

  The official mascot, Zabivaka, was chosen by public vote from three finalists: a cat, a tiger, and a wolf. The wolf won with 53% of the vote, roughly 1 million ballots. His name blends the Russian words for "hothead" and "to score". The official match ball, the Telstar 18, took its name from the first Adidas World Cup ball used in 1970. Goalkeepers quickly complained that the new version was slippery and prone to unpredictable flight. Two balls burst during the France-Australia group stage match, feeding further scrutiny of its design.

  The official tournament song, "Live It Up", featured Will Smith, Nicky Jam, and Era Istrefi, released on the 25th of May 2018. The opening ceremony itself included a performance by Robbie Williams, a duet with Russian soprano Aida Garifullina, and the appearance of Brazilian striker Ronaldo, who entered with a child in a Russia jersey and later returned with the official match ball, which had spent time aboard the International Space Station before being brought back to Earth in early June.

  The final tournament attendance came to more than 3 million. A cumulative live audience of 12.224 billion viewers watched across the competition, a 2.1% increase over the 2014 average. The live global one-minute reach of the final alone reached 1.12 billion people, with 884.37 million watching on in-home television and a further 231.82 million following through out-of-home or digital-only sources.