PROGRAMMING NOTE: For obvious scheduling reasons, we are publishing this to coincide with the start of the World Cup(s!) today, but we will be back on our regular Wednesday schedule next week.

As the first match kicks off this afternoon for the 2026 FIFA World Cup, marking the 23rd time this tournament has been held, millions will be watching and hoping against hope that all the animus and anger that has led up to the moment will be left behind when the whistle blows. Which usually doesn’t happen, of course. But it’s somewhat important — or at least will make your viewing experience easier to enjoy — to understand that essentially every single one that has ever happened has been controversial on some level.

Yes, even (maybe especially?) the first one.

For the most part, these controversies have been related to how host countries have ended up being selected to stage each tournament, almost all of which have been (as you may have guessed) centered around corruptions and bribery¹. But as more and more money has been infused into the process and the viewing audience has grown larger and larger, the last few iterations of the tournament have been a real shitshow from a PR perspective for countries willing to do whatever it takes to get their spot at the trough.

Most recently, 2022’s host Qatar essentially banned the LGBTQ community from the tournament and used slave labor to build their stadiums². Russia, where the games were held in 2018, also used slave labor to build their stadiums, alongside other issues ranging from racism and homophobia amongst fans to the annexation of Crimea³ ( which would lead to them being banned from the Olympics and most other international competitions, including subsequent World Cups). Even Brazil, perhaps the most futebol-mad country on earth, had aversions to the tournament in 2014 arise internally amid discussions about the allocation of the host country’s limited resources.

Rancor surrounding this year’s run (which is taking place right here in the good ole USA, along with our co-hosts north and south of our borders) comes from internal and external distaste about what’s happening in our country. Both as a general proposition and, in particular, the ways in which it has manifested itself through the prism of the tournament. Unsurprisingly, given both the current “climate” and the level of shittiness the transgressions have reached, the biggest story in the lead up to today has been the ways in which a Somalian ref and Iranian players and staff have been specifically targeted for visa issues in the lead up to the games.

Which is, for those that pay attention to such things, almost entirely a function — as has been the case for most of the last decade — of the worst person America has ever produced being put in charge of the country⁴ and using that position of power to go out of his way to harm people he sees as enemies. Bullying those deemed to not belong here has been a part of the gameplan since that fateful day on the escalator and there’s perhaps no other sporting event (not even his birthday party on the White House lawn) that allows itself to be bullied so easily by autocrats as a FIFA World Cup.

Now, of course, every four years, the Olympics also has its issues. However, because of the diffuse nature of the sports being exhibited, and how they are governed by a subset of distinct international governing bodies centering entirely separate fields of athletics, the games themselves inherently come from a place of something resembling compromise and consensus. Or at least moreso than FIFA strong-arming every team into falling in line. Which seems to have led to a somewhat less sycophantic relationship between Olympic host cities and the organizers because there’s so many competing interests and constituent parts to work through.

The IOC itself is as susceptible to corruption as FIFA, obviously, and especially when it comes to the when and where of each quadrennial iteration. But the individual Olympic events and athletes themselves are at a slight remove from the gaping maw of consumerism and greed that threatens to devour the World Cup every four years. Each small bit of Olympic competition isn’t a spectacle unto itself, but discrete instances that create a mosaic of a given games. On the other hand, because FIFA is a series of interconnected federations more or less trying to work towards the same objectives⁵, all taking part in a streamlined tournament centered around a single concept, there are far fewer checks and balances to prevent the hegemony that FIFA has over the proceedings.

This kind of control leads every team and game to be painted with the same broad brush of greed that allows for things as annoying as commercials during in-game action to actual grave injustices happening in plain sight. Just so that nations ill-prepared for the festivities can use FIFA’s branding to sportswash human rights abuses and bigotry in exchange for under the table payments to the cartel’s c-suite. All of it done under the guise of a commitment to “growing” what is already the most popular recreational activity in the history of mankind into an even bigger behemoth.

Which is one of the reasons we will not be covering much of the tournament here over the next month⁶. But while there’s probably not much hope for the FIFA part of the equation, the basic idea of a World Cup is not entirely without merit. In fact, to us, the idea of gathering people from around the world for a singular event meant to celebrate the full breadth of human experiences and the connective power of sports is a pretty fucking great one. If (as our motto and mission statement suggests) all sports are good sports, there’s no greater sports than those which celebrate the very idea of one.

And it’s why we’re so thankful at obscure sports america HQ that we have not one but two other World Cups starting this weekend in two of the sports we cover pretty prominently in this space: women’s cricket and darts.

With darts, the World Cup (which starts today at 1300 and will go through Sunday afternoon/early evening) represents a wholly unique experience for both the fans and players at the highest level of the sport. Unlike literally every other tournament on the PDC calendar, the World Cup is a doubles tournament and the only one where the players are explicitly representing their countries, pushing the enthusiasm behind the Home Nation Qualifier concept from their European Tour to its logical extreme.

Doubles darts⁷ itself creates dynamics unlike any other you’ll see on the oche, as teams who are able to compliment each other can consistently out perform far more high-powered pairs simply by being the yin to the other’s yang. While margins between the very best in the world and the middle of the pack on the PDC Order of Merit are more significant than maybe any sports outside of tennis, the tendency of the top players towards very specific (and somewhat convergent play styles) can lead to what feels like a surefire pair of literal world beaters to be knocked out earlier on in the tournament at a much higher rate than they would otherwise individually.

And the intersection of national pride with performing under the banner of your home county just makes everything that happens mean more, both for the players themselves and against the opponents they come up against. It’s genuinely beautiful to watch, which is not often the case in darts, a sport played by men built like fire hydrants that involves throwing pointy objects at round patches of grass.

On the other end of the “aesthetically pleasing sports” spectrum is cricket, which also has perhaps the only legitimate claim to be competition for soccer as the world’s most popular sport (at least relative to its core accessibility as a concept⁸) and will be hosting its own world cup — the second this year for the sport (and its governing body, the ICC) — starting tomorrow. The festivities will begin with the hosts, the English Women’s team, playing against their counterparts from Sri Lanka to kick off a month’s long showcase of the finest bat-and-ball game in the world.

Women’s cricket has developed significantly over the last few years, with a doubling of participation in India (in many ways the beating heart of the sport over the last half century, at least) since just 2020 and England seeing one out of every six girls currently participating in the sport at a youth level. This has come alongside increased wages for women’s players across the globe, both at a national team level and those franchised competitions like The Hundred in England.

And, as Brad loves to say, cricket is the perfect sport to watch in the summer, with a mix of pace and promise in each individual delivery that fits the vibes of the season almost exactly. All while providing a kind of continuous (and contiguous) entertainment that is basically unique in the wide world of sports, obscure or otherwise. Which is why we’ll be covering it fairly consistently here in the Palace of Wisdom, including (an attempt!) at “live blogging” the matches on our Bluesky account and providing it with its own section in our weekly newsletter.

For now, though, let’s all just enjoy what should be one of the more exciting sports weekends in recent memory.