World Cup 2026: Great stories, little risk – will the new format work?

Lionel Messi, Kylian Mbappe, Erling Haaland, Cristiano Ronaldo and Harry Kane have been traded. Electric race for the golden boot It made a lot of headlines.

It was a gift to FIFA itself, with the world’s most famous players all on display trying to outdo each other.

But the World Cup is not only about the names of the stars, certainly at the team level.

The color and character of football from around the world will take the spotlight.

We haven’t had any shock defeats in meaningful matches for big teams like Saudi Arabia’s thrashing of champions Argentina four years ago.

But there were true stories.

It is expected that Cape Verde, an island nation on the Atlantic Ocean, did not come to the World Cup. And they were written by many before entering the plane.

After all, who would have thought that they would be in a group that included Uruguay and European champions Spain?

It was impressive for Cape Verde to take a point from Spain and stop them from scoring. Not only this, they also drew 2-2 with Uruguay.

The draw with Saudi Arabia in the last group game Ranked second in the group And on Friday, the day with the world championship Argentina in Miami.

Well, they may be the only team to finish in the top two with three points, but they did what they had to do.

Infantino’s plan couldn’t be more convincing. Cape Verde were the poster boys.

Vozinha is a 40-year-old goalkeeper. Now a social media star Thanks to his heroics against Spain.

Starting the game with 50,000 followers on Instagram, it shot up to five million after the full season. 16.7 million at the last count.

Then his mother, who could not attend the World Cup due to the cost of getting an American visa, He was able to fly for the Uruguay game..

It’s a story only a World Cup can create for a player like Vozinha, who has spent his career in Moldova, Cyprus, Slovakia and Portugal’s second division.