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Moderated by
Simon Kuper
Award-winning British-French journalist and author

Hari Ram
Finance Transformation Leader – Infosys BPM

Corporate

Simon Kuper on the football world cup and the momentum of sport

overview

Very few writers have chronicled football’s evolution as insightfully as Simon Kuper, the award-winning Financial Times journalist and author of The World Cup Fever. Here, Kuper explores how the world’s most-watched sport mirrors our politics, economics, and society, with Hari Ram, leader at Infosys BPM. Kuper touches upon football’s early postwar idealism to today’s billion-dollar ecosystem of power, prestige, and soft diplomacy.

Tracing the lineage of the FIFA World Cup from its founder Jules Rimet’s dream of post-war reconciliation to Gianni Infantino’s global spectacle, Kuper, like most modern quantum physicists, argues that football remains both unchanged and ever-changing — a unifying force that has, paradoxically, been shaped by dictators, money, and the global media machine.

For Kuper, the story of football is the story of humanity: our search for identity, belonging, and meaning — played out every four years on the world’s biggest stage.

 

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from trench warfare to global spectacle

Kuper recounts how Jules Rimet, scarred by his years in World War I, imagined football as a tool for peace — a “reconciliation of peoples through sport.” But the game’s massive success in the subsequent years couldn’t but snare-entangle it with politics.

From Mussolini’s Italy in 1934 to modern-day Qatar and Saudi Arabia, Kuper draws a clear line between sport as idealism and sport as diplomacy.

who really wins the world cup?

While nations pour billions into hosting, the economic math rarely adds up. “The host pays the cost. FIFA takes the benefits,” Kuper puts it bluntly. Despite glittering stadiums and broadcast rights, he notes, FIFA remains a modest business with extraordinary influence. The real legacy, he argues, should be in building playing fields, not monuments.

Mandela, Soweto, and the soul of sport

Reflecting on his personal connection to South Africa, Kuper revisits the 1995 Rugby World Cup and the 2010 FIFA World Cup as profound moments of nation-building. “Mandela had to create a country where everyone belonged,” he says. “Sport became the language of reconciliation.” Though post-apartheid South Africa struggles with poverty and crime, Kuper believes the country’s shared sense of identity — forged in sport — remains a triumph.

money, media, and meaning

Kuper doesn’t lament football’s commercialization — he contextualizes it. From Uruguay 1930 to Saudi Arabia 2034, money has always powered the game. What’s changed is scale. As the sport globalized, the World Cup became a television-first event, designed for broadcast, not the stands. “It never truly belonged to the ordinary fan,” Kuper notes — though billions still find collective joy in watching from their homes, united by screens instead of stadiums.

the integrity question

From rigged draws to corrupt referees, Kuper details how integrity has long shadowed the sport. Even so, he sees progress. VAR (Video Assistant Referee) has made refereeing more accurate; fan scrutiny keeps FIFA more transparent. Yet, he warns, “I don’t trust the integrity of games completely” — citing match-fixing and political interference as recurring concerns.

women’s game rising

Kuper celebrates the meteoric growth of women’s football — long suppressed by federations that banned it for decades. Today, he says, “women’s football deserves reparations” for lost time. The passion to play and watch has always existed; only now is it being unleashed.

technology, clubs, and the future

As technology reshapes how fans watch and discuss games, Kuper notes that “the World Cup isn’t about the best football anymore — it’s about meaning.” With superclubs like Real Madrid and Manchester City outclassing national teams, the magic of the Cup lies in belonging, not performance. “It’s still the one event that binds a nation together,” he adds.


about the speakers


Simon Kuper

Simon Kuper, award-winning British-French journalist and author
Simon Kuper is a British-French journalist and author known for his sharp, cross-disciplinary insights on sport, politics, and culture. He joined the Financial Times in 1994, initially writing the daily currencies column before returning in 2002 as a sports columnist. Today, he contributes a widely read Weekend FT column covering global cities, from London and Paris to Johannesburg and Miami. Educated at Oxford and Harvard, Kuper has authored several acclaimed books—including Football Against the Enemy. He is the winner of the William Hill Sports Book of the Year, and is regarded as one of the world’s leading voices on football and society.

 
Hari Ram

Hari Ram, Finance Transformation Leader – Infosys BPM
Hari Ram, the Finance Transformation Lead at Infosys BPM, collaborates closely with CFO's organizations to drive and achieve their Finance agenda encompassing technology and business processes. As part of our exploration into AI's applications across various domains, Hari is engaging with industry leaders to grasp the implications of AI and identify crucial insights and potential considerations. Stay tuned for valuable perspectives on the evolving landscape of AI and its significance. #FinanceTransformation #AI #InfosysBPM.

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