Did you enjoy the Lionel Messi Show last night? Well strap in because today you get its nefarious, significantly worse twin, the Cristiano Ronaldo Experience.
England also kicks off their World Cup campaign with a rematch of the 2018 semifinal against Croatia before CONCACAF, Africa and Asia take centerstage at night.
The new issue of IV: The Sounder at Heart magazine is now available for pre-order. Issue 2 will focus on Seattle’s role in the 2026 World Cup.
What’s interesting today?
England and Croatia begin their World Cup campaigns with a rematch of the classic 2018 semifinal and we’ll surely hear plenty about that match, Harry Kane trying to put a bow on the best season of his legendary career and whether Luka Modrić and the rest of the Croatian geriatrics have enough left in the tank for one more run, but there’s one thing to watch that might define this game and the entire tournament – set pieces.
The Three Lions are long-time devotees of set-piece culture, with Gareth Southgate taking it to a new level in the last decade as he looked to the NFL and NBA for inspiration on how to institute plays they could execute from dead balls. It worked, with England reaching the World Cup semifinals in 2018 for the first time since 1990 and reaching the final of the Euros for the first time ever in 2021 before repeating the feat in 2024.
Set-piece dominance became a Three Lions hallmark, and in the last year it overtook all of English soccer. Arsenal won the Premier League in large part due to their set-piece excellence. Even near the bottom of the table, Tottenham Hotspur only avoided relegation because they were one of the league’s better teams attacking dead balls. And it spread beyond the British Isles as the season went on too, with the Bundesliga also tilting their tactical approaches to emphasize set pieces.
The reason this happened was that clubs realized that if they could stack players in front of the goalkeeper and keep him from coming out to collect the cross, they could become especially deadly on corner kicks. Michael Caley dubbed it the “meat wall” and it became the best attacking tactic in world soccer.
The meat wall and a general reliance on set pieces is especially valuable in international soccer, where teams play together infrequently, have less time to train and games can be much choppier. Teaching open play systems is complex and often out of the reach of international soccer because of the circumstances, but a set piece play with a couple screens and now maybe putting two attackers in the goalkeeper’s face? That’s quick and easy to train in a couple weeks before the World Cup.
Because a set-piece-heavy sport is hardly beautiful, there was some hope that maybe FIFA would instruct referees to crack down on the meat wall and screens. Thus far they haven’t, with Czechia finding success with plenty of physicality on long throws, Germany setting some vicious screens that went uncalled, but Sweden, Bosnia and Norway are the only ones who have tried it a couple times, and it didn’t deliver a goal until the Norwegians’ capper yesterday.
England will almost certainly go full meat wall. They’ll add screens. Long throws might even be in the mix.
Whether the referee lets the Three Lions get away with maximum set piece tactics and physicality will be a sign to us and to the rest of the teams in the tournament about whether it’s a viable tactic going forward.
It’d be a shame if that’s what this World Cup devolves into. England have Kane, Bukayo Saka and Jude Bellingham, so they should be playing exciting soccer, but if they’re afforded the opportunity to defend with no risks and make set pieces their whole attack, they’ll do it. Germany and Netherlands will probably follow suit if they see England given the green light and a dozen more teams might do so as well.
How this game is refereed, especially set pieces, won’t just decide who wins three points, but it might clue us into who’s going to win the entire tournament.
There’s a pretty easy argument to be made that Portugal have the best midfield at this World Cup.
Vitinha and João Neves aren’t just phenomenal, but they play together week in, week out for back-to-back Champions League winners Paris Saint-Germain so they are also excellent at playing with each other. Matheus Nunes, Bruno Fernandes, Bernardo Silva and Rúben Neves join them in a midfield crop that has stars, familiarity, depth and versatility.
And we all know that any team that can dominate the middle of the park can dominate a game, so why don’t Portugal rank as one of the tournament favorites?
It’s not as if they don’t have good defenders with Rúben Dias leading a capable back line. Gonçalo Ramos is a proven forward too, while Rafael Leão, Pedro Neto and Francisco Conceição have legitimate match-winning talent up front. They’ve even been good of late, having cruised to qualification and they’ve lost just once in the last year.
The problem is the man who just won’t go away, Cristiano Ronaldo.
Now 41 years old and coming off his fourth straight season of stat padding in the Saudi Pro League, Ronaldo is still in the Portugal squad and as much of an issue as he has been for years. He doesn’t have the movement he once did, can’t play out wide, isn’t capable of contributing defensive and his one-track mind of looking towards goal means he hardly combines with his teammates.
It’s remarkable that he’s still a capable professional at his age, but he hasn’t been a capable high-level international player for a long time now, putting an anchor on the team at the last Euros, where he played 485 minutes without a goal. He was hardly better in the 2022 World Cup, notching just one penalty kick tally in 290 minutes. And because he does little else than plant himself in the box and wait to get shots away, he’s not useful if he’s not scoring.
Why Portugal haven’t moved on from him is a football mystery, but Ronaldo has long existed outside the basic rules of football. He’s not in this team because he helps the team win. He’s there to be Ronaldo, and Portugal have decided they would rather have Ronaldo on a loser than lose the spotlight and have a better chance at lifting the World Cup.
Maybe Portugal can still make a run if Roberto Martinez is willing to leave his aging star on the bench. We’ll get our first look today at whether that’s even on the table, and how serious of a contender Portugal really are.
Speaking of aging stars, we’ll also get a glimpse at what James Rodríguez has left in the tank today when Colombia take on Uzbekistan.
The man who parlayed his scintillating Golden Boot performance at the 2014 World Cup into a Real Madrid move that was the fourth most expensive transfer ever at the time will turn 35 years old during this tournament and has never reached the heights of 12 years ago.
Rodríguez had some good and productive seasons for Real Madrid and Bayern Munich, but the injuries that were always a problem for him for both club and country got worse as his career devolved over the last five years. He’s played in Saudi Arabia, Greece, Brazil, Spain, Mexico, just trying to keep his career going so he could play for Colombia. He even joined Minnesota United this spring, playing six times in a transparent bid to prove he was worth taking to this World Cup.
There’s reason to think that maybe Rodríguez still has something left in him considering he hardly looked any better two years ago when he was on his way to Copa America, only to see a tournament record with six assists. He’s as skillful as ever and just hoping he can drag his body along enough to show that off.
Don’t expect heavy minutes for Rodríguez today, or at any point in the tournament, but we’ve seen him pull a magic trick or two before and we know that in international tournaments, that a moment of brilliance can be the difference between a group stage exit and a deep run. Fingers crossed the Colombian can do it one more time.
Today's games
Portugal vs. DR Congo
Time: 10 am Pacific
Where: NRG Stadium, Houston, TX
TV: Fox, Telemundo
Online: Tubi, Fox One, Peacock
England vs. Croatia
Time: 1 pm Pacific
Where: AT&T Stadium, Arlington, TX
TV: Fox, Telemundo
Online: Tubi, Fox One, Peacock
Ghana vs. Panama
Time: 4 pm Pacific
Where: BMO Field, Toronto, ON
TV: FS1, Telemundo
Online: Tubi, Fox One, Peacock
Uzbekistan vs. Colombia
Time: 7 pm Pacific
Where: Estadio Azteca, Mexico City, CDMX
TV: FS1, Telemundo
Online: Tubi, Fox One, Peacock
