MIKE WILLIAMS argues that football has become a stage for the exhibition of nationalism and looks at the consequences for the beautiful game…

B efore June 10th, the universe was unique for being the only phenomenon known to man that expands at an increasing rate day by day, unconstrained by time and space. One can now cite the world market for football as operating on similar principles. Football reaches a larger global audience and consumes a larger proportion of the word's passion than ever before. An incredible 2 billion people watched the World Cup opener between Scotland and Brazil. Hibernian fans aside, who would have ever guessed that Jim Leighton could pull a larger audience than Carl Lewis?

But why has there been a mushrooming need in humans around the planet to consumer soccer? It is surely not just the consequence of an intuitive love of the beautiful game. Part of the answer lies in the way in which football has followed the trend set by Coca Cola and McDonalds and marketed itself as a global product. This process has of course, depended upon the more general development of the global consumer: a curious creature which has evolved over the last ten to twenty years in response to an environment saturated with mass media transmissions promoting the wares of multinational corporate giants.

The success of this 'mass' or 'global' process has been to entangle everyone and everything in it's net. The world stage is now the only stage on which to compete. This applies even to the governments of nation states, whose fitness for the job often depends on their ability to be seen to be making it on the world stage. Or world stages. Until Microsoft find some way of developing a programme which combines the various aspects of a nation's success into a sum digital score, there will always be a number of stages upon which nation states can prove their aptitude in global battle. The nuclear stage is one such stage. By flexing their atomic capacity, the Governments of India and Pakistan have both earned the respect of their people even if the money spent would have otherwise gone on alleviating poverty and misery. The economic stage is another. The Japanese government has long been judged for it's ability to keep Japan at the number one spot as the world's top economy.

Taking their place next to these and other stages (the space race and the Olympic Games) the World Cup is now considered by many states as a new theatre open for the expression of nationalism. The consequences for the game of football will be radical. Football will change. No longer just a game nor a business, but a business of politics it will receive incredible amounts of financial attention from governments and much more spiritual attention from people around the world. This is more the likely when one considers that poorer nations will see achievement on the football stage as a substitute to their doomed attempts in achieving military or economic success. Aggressive regimes such as those of Iraq, Nigeria, Pakistan and India will all want to ensure success. Money will be no problem, as the track records of most nations show a penchant for catching the eye of the international neighbourhood through grandiose front garden projects at the cost of continuing poverty in their own back yards. Most nation states will be quite prepared to eat into their national budgets and secure international loans to develop their soccer teams.

In addition to attracting the attentions of power craving Third World leaders, the World Cup is also likely to be seen as an additional opportunity for the self-aggrandising indulgence of those nations who already boast fine manes of economy and nuclear technology. Thus countries such as the USA, China and Japan are likely to join a number of European counties investing in yet another chance to see their names glittering in victory above the global flotsam. As a consequence, while such investment may not bring immediate success, in the long term we can expect to see the likes of USA, China and Japan replace the likes of England, Argentina and Holland as the premiere footballing nations due to larger resources of manpower and finance.

We can also expect the changes discussed to effect a sea change in global culture, as the media's attention on the beautiful game encourages young people to drop cricket, badminton and other sports and take up the game. This cultural transfusion of soccer into the people of the world will neutralise the advantage of countries like Brazil and Italy where soccer has traditionally run through the blood. The main activity taking place on the beaches of Rio will be mirrored by those activities taking place on the beaches of Shenzen. The great players of the next century are just as likely to be called Shi Shun Li as Ronaldo. Already the World Cup is reflecting these changes. Teams like USA and Japan are becoming regular fixtures in the final competition. In Africa, the powerhouses of Nigeria and South Africa have begun to assert their dominance on the game. Iran had 120, 000 fans attend their qualifying match with Australia. The only anomaly is China who in possessing a quarter of the world's population somehow contrived to miss out on this years finals by drawing with Qatar. That wont happen again.

For those on the other side of the coin, the smaller nations who have had a past history of footballing success, the consequences will be dire. As financial and human investment in soccer increases world-wide, smaller nations who are not able to match the funding of the larger nation states will surely fall by the way side. Thus we have already seen the Welsh national team slip into disrepair. With the increasing importance of soccer growing throughout Europe, Wales can no longer hope to challenge for a place in the World Cup with a part-time manager and a nation of just over 3 million people. The future for Scotland also looks dire. They can expect France 1998 to be their last World Cup because, save for a freak intervention from God in which eleven McMaradonas are all born in the same year, their limited resources will not allow them to compete with neighbours such as England where there is a population of 60 million and huge revenues to call on thanks to the Premiere League.

And as soccer investment increases world wide, causing a global inflation in both the standards of soccer played and the amount of time and money needed to secure success, so the world of football will balloon more and more. Of course returning back to the laws of nature, as any keen physicist knows, it is predicted that our ever expanding universe will eventually slow down, stop and then contract back in on itself destroying all the splendour and beauty it once created. But do not fear. We need not worry about the natural self-destruction of soccer. Current events suggests that before the global stage of football succumbs to the laws of physics, it is much more likely to have been blown to smithereens as the indirect consequence of the same laws taking effect on a different stage for national self-aggrandisement. Then we can really talk about soccer mushrooming!