Overall, the World Cup hosted by the United States, Canada and Mexico has been a huge hit and there were so many feel-good stories.

Whether it was foreign visitors falling in love with our spacious stadiums and Ranch dressing or American (and other fans) adopting Norway as its second favorite team, the past five weeks have been a lot of fun in the whole. And there has been great soccer — or futbol as others outside our shores call the game.

At age 39, Lionel Messi has aged like a fine wine, and in his last two World Cups, his splendid play led Argentina to another deep run. But in the end, Spain was just better, peppering the goal until one finally landed inside the net. And while Messi at age 39 makes a strong claim as the best player ever, Spain’s Lamine Yamal, who turned 19 just a few days ago and still wearing braces on his teeth, showed that the soccer world is his oyster.

Expanding the field to 48 teams introduced even casual fans to countries like Cape Verde, a country off the coast of Africa with just over 500,000 residents. Still, this tiny island nation tied Spain 0-0 in group play, and in the first round of the knockout stage, put a huge scare into Argentina, finally succumbing in extra time, 3-2.

Though I didn’t attend a game personally, I still got to see the World Cup a bit up close. My wife Heidi and I went on an Alaskan Cruise and our ship left Vancouver the morning Turkiye and Australia were set to play. We spent a couple of days in Vancouver before embarking, enjoying the spirit of the competition that had engulfed the city talking with Aussie and Turkish fans alike.

Poolside on our cruise ship, World Cup games were played on a big movie screen and surprisingly there were plenty of foreign passengers, and Americans as well, that were into it.

When we returned to Vancouver, we drove to Seattle. We missed the American victory over Australia that clinched the top spot for the United States in Group D by a day. We actually went to see the Seattle Mariners host the Boston Red Sox in our own national pastime, but our soccer team’s triumph was recognized and celebrated loudly at the game.

Everyone seemed in a great mood and a 3-2 loss to Turkiye didn’t seem to matter at all. The USA made the knockout stage and won its first game 2-0 over Bosnia-Herzegovina even scoring a goal with just 10 players. That’s because star player Folarin Balogun was given a red card for a dangerous play. And this is where things went a bit sideways.

Players receiving a red card are dismissed from the game they are currently playing and then suspended for the next meaning Balogun would miss the Round of 16 game versus Belgium.

But for the first time in over 60 years FIFA overturned the red card suspension allowing Balogun to play. Things seemed a bit fishy when President Donald Trump got involved bragging about how he called FIFA President Gianni Infantino and restored Balogun’s playing status.

Infantino and Trump have a strange relationship, and let’s just say the former seems to be a big fan of the latter. And months before, Infantino gave Trump a special “FIFA Peace Prize” which proved ironic in the space of a New York Minute.

If the Americans did defeat Belgium, the victory would be tainted. But instead of winning, Belgium beat the USA handily 4-1. And the Belgians did rub it in Trump’s face. After their fourth goal, Belgian players imitated the well-known dancing moves of the President and then repeated it in the locker room. A meme from Belgium Soccer saying, “Overturn This!” with the score 4-1 below further showed that the Belgians were fired up by the FIFA decision and our President’s claims of being the reason behind it.

But the bigger reason for many that the American team faltered so badly lied in the increased pressure that came because of Trump’s involvement. The USA team seemed nervous, played poorly and made silly mistakes.

Sadly, the result of the game also took away a lot of good will toward the United States from international fans, and there was also a strong negative reaction American fans had toward its own team after they lost. Where a week before, the team was being celebrated, now its coach and players were targets of derision.

Most of the truly mean criticism laid at the hands of goalie Matt Freese for his huge blunder that led to the third Belgian goal and Christian Pulisic, considered America’s best overall player but who missed significant minutes because of nagging injuries and never really was a factor. Defender Tim Ream and Balogun himself also were in the sights of American fans and sports analysts for some vitriol.

As one would also expect, the Iranian team was treated poorly by FIFA and American governmental officials. FIFA didn’t have the good sense to adjust the sites of games and have Iran at least play their group stage games in either Canada or Mexico. Their training facilities were moved from Arizona to Tijuana, Mexico and many of the team personnel had to leave the country after each game.

In the end, Iran didn’t advance out of group play with three draws. In their last game against Egypt, a go-ahead goal was disallowed that would have sent them to the knockout stage.

Even before the World Cup started, a Somalian referee was denied entrance into the country. However, our neighbors to the north came to his rescue and FIFA allowed him to work games in Canada.

And of course, there were the usual controversies, and some involved finalist Argentina. In their Round of 16 game vs. Egypt, an Egyptian goal was taken off the scoreboard, and then in their quarterfinal match against Switzerland, a Swiss player who had received a yellow card in the first half was sent off in the second half with another for basically flopping. The Swiss got the game to extra time but being a man down against Messi and company was too much and Argentina scored two goals to win 3-1.

Overall, by any measure, the 2026 World Cup has been a success. Any event lasting several weeks that is run by an inherently corrupt organization like FIFA is going to have some hiccups. Trump gave one last amusing moment insisting that he co-present the World Cup trophy to Spaniards, while the Canadian and Mexican leaders stood to the side. After the presentation, Infantino was mostly able to usher Trump away so the Spanish team could celebrate with the trophy and pose for a team picture. Also, thank goodness for photoshop.

The United States gets another great chance to showcase itself in 2028 at the summer Olympics hosted by Los Angeles. Hopefully, politics can be set aside with total attention on the great athletic competition. But then again, Trump is Trump and the International Olympic Committee is a bit too much like FIFA.

Brian E. Preece is a retired social studies educator and coach. As a wrestling coach, he was named as the 2006 Utah Coach of the Year by the National Wrestling Coaches Association. He has also co-authored three books and has been a sports journalist for parts of five decades.