Simon Kuper Country Quotations

People are enormously disappointed because if there's one country that really expected to be going and has a high opinion of its own qualities, it's Holland.

Even before 2007, this half of a small island was the richest football country on earth. In 2005-2006 the Premiership's total revenue was about £1.4bn, 40 per cent more than its nearest rival, Italy's Serie A. That was before take-off. Now foreign television channels are sending so much cash that the Premiership is expected to take in nearly £1.8bn this season. Even the team that finishes bottom of the table (Wigan might be a good bet) will get £26.8m from TV. That's more than all of Argentine or Belgian football put together.

It seems that soccer tournaments create those relationships: people gathered together in pubs and living rooms, a whole country suddenly caring about the same event. A World Cup is the sort of common project that otherwise barely exists in modern societies.