How righteous outrage scored a rare victory over greed at World Cup

The most inspirational soccer story of the summer happened two weeks after the World Cup ended.

Righteous outrage came out of nowhere to beat the odds, bringing continents together like even the plucky upstarts from Cape Verde couldn’t.

And before we go too far over the top celebrating the idea that some things can’t be bought or sold, it’s important to be clear about what happened this week when the unscrupulous man in charge of the biggest soccer tournament in the world fell on his face.

It’s not that the little guys won.

It’s just that the greediest guys didn’t.

These days, we’ll take victories where we can find them. And to be sure, one can be found in the fact that FIFA president Gianni Infantino was shamed into backtracking out of an audacious plan to sell a stake of the World Cup to outsiders.

Infantino wanted to create a $20 billion company to run the tournament by selling to investors including Joshua Kushner, the brother of the son-in-law of FIFA Peace Prize winner Donald Trump. Per Infantino, the plan would have raised up to $4.2 billion that could have been distributed to its 211 national member federations “by carefully selecting long-term investors who will purchase minority, non-controlling interests.”

How unpopular was this idea?

Europe threatened a continent-wide boycott. North and Central America united against it. Asia did the same. And perhaps most stunningly, Infantino’s private equity scheme proved to be a bridge too far for his senior adviser, a former Goldman Sachs partner named Carlos Cordeiro. 

When even a retired investment banker is resigning in protest over a plan that, as Cordeiro wrote, he opposed “unequivocally” because it was “a bad deal for the long-term future of this sport,” you know that plan must be truly objectionable.

Still, it’s a surprise that it didn’t proceed anyway. 

To follow sports in the year 2026 is to become accustomed to the teams and traditions you love being turned into some rich guy’s asset. Over the past few years, private equity has taken hold of college conferences and university athletic departments. Leagues and teams that haven’t sold out to gambling companies are becoming fewer and farther between.

And then there are the infuriating stories like the one now unfolding in Portland, where new Trail Blazers owner Tom Dundon is applying all the practices he employed in the world of subprime lending to one of the NBA’s most beloved franchises.

After reportedly leaving his two-way players home during the playoffs, forcing staffers to check out of hotel rooms early, and laying off longtime team broadcasters, Dundon now has focused on demanding expensive arena renovations. And his employees have taken to bashing the city, while asking it for help.

“The arena is only a small piece of that bigger picture,” Dewayne Hankins, the Trail Blazers’ president of business operations, told the city council this week, according to OPB. “Portland’s current stagnant business climate, high income taxes, and divisive political environment make this a tough city to invest in. It makes it harder to sell tickets, secure corporate partnerships and … recruit players.”

You can see the game here. As countless other pro sports teams have done in countless other markets, the franchise is using the unspoken threat of relocation to get the public to give in. But if Portland was such “a tough city to invest in,” then why did Dundon just invest there? 

Chances are, he’ll get what he wants. There will be backlash, but it might not be enough to change anything.

That’s why it’s worth taking note when the backlash works, even when it comes to an enterprise as commercialized as the World Cup. Obviously, FIFA is no mom-and-pop shop. Over the years, it’s become synonymous with the concept that money rules everything, and the bidding process for every event has come with whispers of corruption. 

After all, did countries like Russia (2018), Qatar (2022) and Saudi Arabia (2034) earn the right to host because they’re traditional soccer hotbeds? Most people understand what’s going on here.

But every now and then, greed steps over the line. Every now and then, righteous outrage works. And even to those of us who still aren’t sure what constitutes a yellow card?

Soccer can be exciting after all.