Foot­ball fans around the world are to­day ex­pe­ri­enc­ing a touch of “foot­ball ta­ban­ca” fol­low­ing the end of the FI­FA World Cup 2026. Af­ter al­most six weeks of com­pe­ti­tion, the tour­na­ment de­liv­ered the ex­cite­ment, dra­ma and skill ex­pect­ed from the con­test to de­ter­mine the world’s best foot­balling na­tion. The per­for­mances of the 48 par­tic­i­pat­ing coun­tries reaf­firmed foot­ball’s rep­u­ta­tion as the “Beau­ti­ful Game.”

Like any event of this mag­ni­tude, how­ev­er, there were mo­ments that were less than beau­ti­ful. Con­tro­ver­sies emerged both on and off the field, some shaped by geopo­lit­i­cal is­sues. Among them was the re­fusal by the Unit­ed States to grant en­try to FI­FA-ap­point­ed So­ma­li ref­er­ee Omar Ar­tan. Dur­ing the tour­na­ment, de­bate al­so sur­round­ed the over­turn­ing of a red card shown to US play­er Fo­lar­in Ba­lo­gun, al­low­ing him to par­tic­i­pate in the fol­low­ing match.

De­spite these dis­trac­tions, the tour­na­ment, joint­ly host­ed by Cana­da, the Unit­ed States and Mex­i­co, proved a ma­jor suc­cess. Mil­lions at­tend­ed match­es while bil­lions fol­lowed the ac­tion on tele­vi­sion and dig­i­tal plat­forms. The World Cup once again demon­strat­ed foot­ball’s unique abil­i­ty to unite peo­ple across bor­ders and cul­tures.

Be­yond sport, the tour­na­ment de­liv­ered a sig­nif­i­cant eco­nom­ic boost. At­ten­dance, trav­el, ac­com­mo­da­tion, food, en­ter­tain­ment and mer­chan­dise sales gen­er­at­ed bil­lions of dol­lars in ac­tiv­i­ty. At a time when many economies con­tin­ue to grap­ple with the ef­fects of wars and trade dis­putes, the World Cup pro­vid­ed a wel­come in­jec­tion of spend­ing and op­ti­mism.

On the field, Spain emerged as de­served cham­pi­ons. Their dis­ci­plined, or­gan­ised and con­sis­tent style car­ried them through the tour­na­ment and, ul­ti­mate­ly, to vic­to­ry over Ar­genti­na in the fi­nal. Spain’s de­fen­sive strength was ev­i­dent in con­ced­ing on­ly one goal through­out the com­pe­ti­tion. Nine­teen-year-old sen­sa­tion Lamine Ya­mal im­pressed with a se­ries of out­stand­ing per­for­mances, while Fer­ran Tor­res se­cured Span­ish foot­ball his­to­ry by scor­ing the win­ning goal in the fi­nal.

Among the tour­na­ment’s most emo­tion­al mo­ments was the ap­par­ent farewell of Li­onel Mes­si from foot­ball’s biggest stage. The Ar­gen­tine leg­end was vis­i­bly dev­as­tat­ed af­ter miss­ing the op­por­tu­ni­ty to add an­oth­er World Cup ti­tle to his re­mark­able ca­reer.

Ar­genti­na’s dis­ap­point­ment was fur­ther over­shad­owed by re­ports that some play­ers turned their backs dur­ing Spain’s tro­phy pre­sen­ta­tion, a dis­play many viewed as poor sports­man­ship.

The tour­na­ment’s fi­nal four re­flect­ed foot­ball’s es­tab­lished hi­er­ar­chy, with Spain, Ar­genti­na, Eng­land and France reach­ing the se­mi-fi­nals. France can take pride in cap­tain Kylian Mbap­pé win­ning the Gold­en Boot for a sec­ond time as the com­pe­ti­tion’s lead­ing scor­er. Eng­land, led by Jude Belling­ham and Bukayo Sa­ka, al­so demon­strat­ed its con­tin­ued rise among the world’s elite teams.

Yet the great­est win­ner may not have been any sin­gle coun­try. In a world too of­ten di­vid­ed by con­flict, the World Cup brought to­geth­er a record 48 na­tions not on bat­tle­fields, but on foot­ball fields. For a few weeks, com­pe­ti­tion re­placed con­fronta­tion, and shared pas­sion re­placed di­vi­sion. That may be the tour­na­ment’s most im­por­tant vic­to­ry of all.