A geopolitical guide to the 2026 World Cup — who to root for, based on colonial history, active conflicts, far-right governments, and political context. Because football is never just football.
A note on what this means: rooting against a team here is about governments, colonial history, and political structures — not the people. Every country we flag has people within it resisting the very things we criticize. The Americans marching against imperialism, the Germans confronting their history, the Argentines who voted against Milei, the South Africans fighting Afrophobia from the inside — this compass is with them. What we criticize is power, and the degree to which it goes unchallenged.
Upcoming & info window:clear pickreluctantbombingroot: refereeTV offfree game
Past results:✓ won~ drew✗ lost~ drew (ref)📺 TV off✗ bad result
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Rules apply in priority order — higher rules override lower ones. The underdog is auto-detected from FIFA rankings, history, and political context.
Important: rooting against a team means rooting against government action, colonial structures, and policies — not against people. Within every country we criticize, there is resistance. The compass is with those people.
Germany is playing → always against, no exceptionsPrimarily a football verdict: July 8, 2014, Belo Horizonte — Brazil 1–7 Germany. The single most traumatic result in Brazilian football history. The political tags (hegemon, colonizer, far-right history with AfD rising) only reinforce what the pitch already decided.
Argentina is playing → always against, no exceptionsPrimarily a football verdict: Brazil's eternal rival. Pelé × Maradona. Messi. The whole history. The political context — 1978 WC hosted under Videla's dictatorship while 30,000 were disappeared, Milei's current far-right government — reinforces it, but the football rivalry came first.
Argentina × Germany → turn off the TV
Both teams geopolitically compromised + referee is hegemonic/colonial/cursed → turn off the TVWhen neither side is clean and even the referee is from a problematic country (not Global South), there is genuinely no one to root for. Grab a beer, life goes on.
Two "always against" teams → root for the referee (Global South)
One "always against" team + opponent also significantly problematic → root for the refereee.g. USA vs Paraguay: USA always against, but Paraguay is Trump's closest Latin American ally. No clean side.
A team is being actively bombed → root for themOverrides hegemonic/colonial history. Does not override "always against" absolutes.
A team is actively bombing civilians → root against them
Bomber vs major colonial/hegemonic power → root for the refereee.g. Saudi Arabia vs Spain or France — neither side is clean. Active bombing doesn't make a colonial empire the right pick.
A team is a hegemonic power or historical colonizer → root for the other
Former colony playing its specific colonizer → extra weight against the colonizere.g. Ghana vs England, Uruguay vs Spain, Senegal vs France, Algeria vs France, Cabo Verde vs Portugal
A team has a far-right government → root against themCurrent cases in this WC: Netherlands (Wilders), Austria (FPÖ/Kickl), Sweden (SD-backed), Croatia (HDZ+Homeland Movement coalition), Czechia (Babiš/ANO+SPD).
Two hegemonic powers → root for the referee (if from the Global South)
One team is the underdog (auto-detected) → root for them as tiebreakerBased on FIFA ranking gap, first-time qualification, nation size, and historical/political context.
No flags → free game! Root for the best football.
On NATO and anti-Western positioning: Being anti-NATO or skeptical of US-European hegemony is not a problem from this compass's perspective — it's a mainstream position in the Latin American and Global South left. Russia's war on Ukraine is condemned because it bombs civilians, not because Russia resists Western hegemonic expansion, which has legitimate historical roots. These are different things.
On FIFA: Gianni Infantino received Putin's Order of Friendship in 2019. He awarded the inaugural FIFA Peace Prize to Donald Trump in December 2025. He was made honorary citizen of Reggio Calabria — Italy's most mafia-dominated city — by a mayor under investigation for organized crime. He gave Saudi Arabia the 2034 World Cup without a competitive process. He made Trump chair of the organizing taskforce, headquartered in Trump Tower. He has been re-elected unopposed twice and will run again in 2027. Governance expert Mark Pieth: "Blatter is a strange animal — but compared to what is going on inside FIFA now, the dirty tricks of his era are only petty stuff. Infantino copies the autocrats he cosies up to. He loves Trump, he is only driven by power and money, and he has no need for democracy in FIFA." The 2026 WC is projected to earn $9 billion. The 2026 WC is, in one scholar's words, "the apotheosis of sportswashing." None of that stops the games from being beautiful, or from being a site of real political meaning for billions of people — which is exactly why it's worth paying attention.