Soccer is a sport all about rhythm and flow, as the game has become more globalized through the ease of access to media such as sporting events, thanks to the development of television, streaming services, and radio worldwide. As interest in soccer grows, players become national celebrities not just in their home countries or the countries where they play, but around the world. Heroes, villains, and supporting cast are all very crucial parts of the story that soccer is trying to tell, and we as humans always tend to create narratives around these celebrities that make them larger than life when compared to most average people.
With the rise of the internet, it has allowed more people to constantly interact with others and to also constantly be consuming soccer media, whether that be through games being watched on television or highlights of the match being shown on TikTok. The experience of being a soccer fan in the modern age allows you to connect with your team alot more, but the overexposure of your team can take away from the overall magic of the experience. Teams used to invest very heavily in their stadiums and the environments that were a part of those stadiums because that is the only place you would be able to see the team play; you couldn’t watch a highlight on TikTok or watch the game on television; you had to actually be in the stadium to experience the environment.
Teams have more to focus on in the modern age, like streaming rights and who has deals with what television companies. They often put less focus on the stadium and its environment, and that can take away from the experience of watching a game in a stadium. Soccer has always been a sport of spectacle because of the number of people around the world who watch and care about soccer. This has led countries to invest alot of money into these teams and the stadiums they play in. Some stadiums can hold up to 200,000 people, and they are filled quite regularly. The accessibility and flow behind soccer have led to the sport becoming so popular, and with countries like Brazil, England, Italy, and Argentina investing so heavily in the sport, it has allowed it to flourish and become the beautiful game it is today.
The story of soccer’s beautiful evolution throughout the seventies sadly contrasts with the political situation of the seventies in South America, where the decade was marked by political turmoil and dictatorships. The most prominent country that was an example of this was Argentina and its militaristic dictatorship, which had hundreds of thousands of college students and professors “vanish” from the country, all while Argentina was hosting the world cup that they would eventually win. South American countries were entering a great period of political reform and contrasting political ideas on the continent, and this led to many external conflicts as well as internal conflicts, like the one in Argentina.
The biggest external conflict that arose from this time was the aptly named football war between El Salvador and Honduras. After the two countries competed against each other in qualifying matches for the 1969 World Cup, riots broke out over some more deep-rooted issues the two countries had been facing for years, like the mass migration of Salvadorians into Honduras and land reform disputes between the two countries.
Soccer, especially in international competition, can become something more than a sport because of the nationalism most people feel in watching their team play, and if they lose, that can often feel like a reflection of the country, which people do not like. Soccer competitions are often where people feel the most nationalistic, so it would only make sense that it is also the place where they throw the biggest tantrums when their team loses or is “cheated” by the referee.
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