The Geopolitical World Cup: the matches between national teams that carry historical extra-sports rivalries

The World Cup is the most anticipated sporting moment in much of the world... That is, a football event and Messi, Ronaldo, Mbappé or Neymar have nothing to do with the leaders who manage the world's destinies, but the geopolitical conflicts behind each crossing raise expectations. In fact, the stands have historically been used to hold political demonstrations and athletes often made their opinions public.

However, what is being proposed here is a game. It is the possibility of analyzing global tensions that will not disappear because the captains of two teams shake hands in the middle of the playing field, but they won't get worse either due to lack of fair play. They are pearls left by the Qatar 2022 draw and that serve as an excuse to investigate the current geopolitical complexities.

So, for example, if the presidents decided to travel to witness the first phase of Qatar 2022, Joe Biden could share a stand with Iranian denier Ebrahim Raïssi. The US and Iran are part of Group B and, at the same time, they star in one of the most tense scenarios of geopolitics today.

Since the 1979 Islamic revolution marked by the American hostage crisis, relations between the two countries have been bad.

The chapter has been tightened in recent years, since former President Donald Trump withdrew the country from the nuclear agreement, intensified international sanctions and ordered the special operation that killed General Qasem Soleimani, the commander of the elite Quds force of the Revolutionary Guard.

While Biden came to the White House intending to resume the Nuclear Agreement - and as Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Russia and China negotiate to achieve it - the decision is delayed by the same internal US pressures and the lack of a clear guarantee that Tehran will abandon the possibility of building an atomic bomb. In fact, since the pact fell, the Persian regime began to enrich uranium to a purity of 60%, well above the 3.67% allowed under the 2015 pact.

This is the second time Iran and the United States have shared a group in the World Cup. In 1998, in France, Iran defeated the Americans 2-1.

“I am not interested in political issues regarding the United States. We just want to think about football,” Iran coach Dragan Skocic told state agency IRNA after the draw. However, it would not be surprising if in this scenario the Persian regime increased its anti-American rhetoric.

Another fact to keep in mind is that this group is not complete. In addition to the US and Iran, it is made up of England and a fourth contender who will come out of the European repechage. That place will be decided between Ukraine, Wales or Scotland... And if Scotland enters, then we will also talk about extra football rivalries with the English, at least for the songs of the fans and the post-match jokes.

The relationship between English and Scots had centuries of enmity until both kingdoms were unified in 1603 because Elizabeth I of England - who had ordered the killing of Mary, Queen of the Scots - died without descendants. The mutual attempts at invasion were left behind, but the love-hate relationship that today makes them one of the most agitated European classics.

In Group G, the rivalry is not strictly geopolitical, but the footballers themselves took care of bringing their heavy historical burden to the playing field.

The Swiss national team has two figures, Granit Xhaka and Xherdan Shaqiri, in which he places his hopes. Shaqiri was born in Kosovo to Albanian parents, and Xhaka was born in Switzerland and has Kosovar Albanian parents. Both families came to Switzerland escaping the persecution of ethnic Albanians by Serbian nationalists in the 1990s, a conflict in which NATO even intervened to stop hostilities.

In the 2018 World Cup in Russia, in one of the group E matches, both players scored in the match against Serbia and managed to turn an adverse result but the episode crossed the globe for their celebrations... They didn't train, they didn't dance in the round, nor did they make a human mountain, but Shaqiri and Xhaka celebrated in front of the Serbs by gesturing the eagle of the Albanian flag.

The political celebration sought to vindicate the struggle of his parents. In fact, in 1986 in then Yugoslavia, Xhaka's father was arrested for demonstrating against the government of Slobodan Milosevic. At that time the claims of Kosovars, Croats or Bosniaks were severely stifled and he spent three years in prison before regaining his freedom and settling in Switzerland, where in 1992 the now emblem of the national team was born.

Shaqiri experienced horror when he was little and when he was just 2 years old his family fled the bombs and moved to August, where he was able to obtain Swiss nationality.

After the controversy match, FIFA fined $10,126 each for “unsportsmanlike conduct contrary to fair play principles” and a warning, but did not suspend them.

The issue escalated so much that Albanian Premier Edi Rama launched a public campaign to raise the money for the sanction under the slogan “Do not be afraid of the eagle”. And Kosovan Trade Minister Bajram Hasani promised part of his salary to settle the debt. “The emotions that Xhaka and Shaqiri gave us when they celebrated with the eagle are priceless. They were condemned simply because they did not forget their roots,” he declared at the time.

Against this background, any gesture Shaqiri and Xhaka make could raise tension in the first phase confrontation between Switzerland and Serbia scheduled for Friday, December 2.

With fewer volts, in Group A, the Netherlands will face the host with a serious substantive complaint of “modern slavery”. It is that the Netherlands was one of the main detractors of Qatar when it denounced the labour exploitation of immigrant workers in the construction of the infrastructures that will host the World Cup.

Beyond the first phase

The World Cup tests the anxiety of the fans and everyone, absolutely everyone, already thinks about the round of 16 and quarter crosses... And even some risky ones think about possible explosive semifinals.

One of the unexpected crosses in the round of 16, with little chance of happening at football levels but not unlikely, would be a confrontation between Spain and Morocco. In recent days, Pedro Sanchez's change in policy with regard to Western Sahara brought Madrid closer to Rabat but also generated controversy because of the historical turn it involved.

Western Sahara is an extension of desert bordering Morocco, Algeria and Mauritania. This territory was under Spanish occupation from 1904 to 1975. After the Second World War, when the great decolonizations began on the African continent encouraged by the United Nations, the Saharawi people began their claim.

Even today, Western Sahara is a territory pending decolonization. In 1966, the UN called for Spain, as a colonizing power, to organize a referendum for locals to exercise their right to self-determination.

Time passed, and the referendum was not held.

In parallel, the United Nations General Assembly requested the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to offer an advisory opinion on whether Western Sahara, at the time of Spanish colonization, was terra nullis (no man's land) and, if not, what were the ties with the kingdom of Morocco and Mauritania. The ICJ recognized ties, but not rights. However, King Hassan II of Morocco read the ICJ advisory opinion as an affirmation of his demands on the territory. This is how he embarked on what became known as the “Green March”: about 350,000 Moroccans marched across borders into Western Sahara at the same time as the monarch stationed his troops on the territory.

The situation surprised Spain at a delicate moment. His dictator Francisco Franco was dying, so he dismissed all responsibility, abandoned Western Sahara and allowed the Moroccan advance over the Saharawi people. Spain, Morocco and Mauritania concluded the secret “Madrid Agreements”, with which the Europeans agreed to cede administrative control of the territory to Morocco and Mauritania on February 27, 1976. The day after the summit, the Frente Polisario proclaimed the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR) and the Frente Polisario as its political arm.

Western Sahara is not just a piece of worthless desert. There are the richest phosphate mines in the world, important oil and gas deposits, and on its coasts, numerous fishing grounds.

But now, in a letter from the Spanish head of government to King Mohammed VI, Spain expresses a tacit recognition of Morocco's sovereignty over the occupied territory and abandons the position held to date, approaching the US position and going even further than France and Germany, considering that the Moroccan plan is the best option of all to overcome the conflict. With the maneuver, Spain abandons its historical position and tries to avoid the frequent avalanches of immigrants to Ceuta and Melilla that Morocco encourages as extortion every time it wants to punish its Spanish neighbors.

It is true that a crossing in the World Cup between Spain and Morocco will not cause any discomfort among the protagonists, but it can be a headache for Sánchez, who will see the issue again in the press as he tries to recover from hard blows, such as the unusual and high inflation, the shortage of products due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the alarming unemployment figures.

Another interesting crossover - sporting but also geopolitical - would occur if Argentina and England were second in their groups. Thus, they would change their keys and the possibility of seeing themselves in the second round would open up. In this hypothetical scenario, Argentina could encounter England once again, with the Malvinas conflict in the background, even though relations between the two countries are fluid, the resolution of the United Nations Committee on Decolonization requiring negotiation remains in force and the United Kingdom refuses to talk. In addition, as is often the case, the defiant government of the island can take the opportunity to capitalize on the crossing with some message as witty as it is warlike to which we are accustomed.

If, on the other hand, England comes out first - as the odds set - and France achieves the same in their group, the powerful European teams would cross each other in the quarterfinals. The match could have notes of color because in recent months, except for the impasse that caused Russian invasion of Ukraine, England and France faced each other over the bulky Brexit.

Relations between London and Paris were red-hot in 2021 in what became known as “the war of migrants” with the arrival of more than 28,000 people on boats in the English Channel and the death of at least 27 people during the risky voyage. The British Government even threatened to send the boats back in the face of the inaction of the Macron government.

Of course, in this case, existing rivalries would not prevent a handshake in the world cup stands.

Qatar 2022 does not expect the political implications of “ping pong diplomacy” in the 1970s — when the sportsmen's visit paved the way for then-US President Richard Nixon to travel to China — but it does promise details of color for a hyper-intertwined world like today.

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