(UPDATE: Mexico did in fact win, 2-0, in a fast-paced, energetic and intermittently ugly game. Three players were shown red cards for egregious fouls, two from South Africa and one from Mexico. It seems tensions are running high!)
Regardless of the outcome, the focus on opening day will be on spectacle, showmanship and soccer, in roughly that order. There has been a predictable amount of disorder around the tournament in the Mexican capital, including a teachers’ strike and left-wing street protests. But none of that has anything to do with Donald Trump, who will not be on hand to get booed and pretend he’s being cheered. However security is handled, there will be no ICE officers surveying the crowd with facial-recognition software and abducting people for unstated reasons. Everyone who needed a visa to attend this game, as far as I know, got one with minimal fuss.
