Years ago, Diego Armando Maradona said, “La pelota no se mancha”— the ball does not get stained. Reflecting on a life marked by brilliance, mistakes, and addiction, he believed football had to remain above the failures around it.
After the 2026 World Cup, I am no longer sure. This tournament raised a question: What does football (soccer) mean today, and who still owns it?
Soccer continues to grow in the U.S., yet its culture remains different from most footballing nations. Supporting a club or country often means accepting repeated defeat. Losing is not a defect to be engineered away; it is part of unconditional love to the team, to the country, to the game.
I grew up playing football in Chile. You needed almost nothing: a ball, a wall, and an afternoon. Any child could play, practice, and dream. Today, many children cannot even watch matches. Broadcast rights hide games behind paywalls, while ticket prices push working families away. A sport that once belonged to everyone increasingly serves interests far removed from the field.
The game itself is also changing. Football is both a physical and mental battle, and its continuous rhythm is essential. Yet cooling breaks increasingly feel less like player protection and more like opportunities to insert sponsors and advertising into the match. VAR can correct serious errors, but reviews measured by centimeters interrupt the instinct, ambiguity, strategy, and human judgment that made football beautiful. Spontaneity was never the weakness. It was the point.
Lionel Messi once represented the child with a ball made real: proof that greatness could emerge from modest beginnings. Now he is presented as a product. Controversial decisions surrounding Argentina have led some supporters to suspect FIFA needs his story to continue. That proves no manipulation, but the loss of trust is damaging enough. I want to remember Messi as an example, not a brand.
Still, the game finds a way back. Norway’s supporters filled streets and subway cars with the Viking Row, while Haaland showed humor and humanity beyond his superstar image. Cabo Verde, one of the tournament’s smallest nations, reminded us that courage can challenge power.
Perhaps Maradona was right. The ball itself does not get stained.
We do. And every once in a while, soccer/football becomes beautiful again despite us.
Franco Giovi Zaro
Oak Park