Iconic Moments in Football No.26
All World Cups have an Opening Ceremony. They are not as memorable as the Olympics Opening Ceremonies by a long shot, but today’s Iconic Moment is definitely the exception to the rule!
The 1994 World Cup was hosted in the United States of America and many thought that the American fans wouldn’t be all that interested in the tournament. The Americans had many other sports that they were interested in after all. They had American Football, baseball, basketball and ice hockey. They even called our beloved game soccer!
As it turns out, those who believed that the World Cup would be lost to the host nation were proved completely wrong.
Attendance records were shattered and the average attendance for all of the World Cup games played was a record-breaking 68,626. This is still the highest average attendance of any World Cup to date!
The total attendance for this World Cup was 3,568,567 for the 52 games that were played. This was over a million more than the total amount of fans who attended the previous World Cup in Italy.
What is more incredible about these records is that the 1994 tournament was the last World Cup to have 52 games. From the following tournament in 1998, 32 teams entered meaning a total of 64 games are played in each tournament.
Going back to the Opening Ceremony, glitz and glamour were expected and that is what the fans were given. In a bizarre sequence, singer Diana Ross was singing her famous song ‘I’m Coming Out’ on the pitch and dancing around on the pitch.
As part of her routine, Ross was then given the easy task of kicking a ball past a goalkeeper and into an over-sized goal. The goal was then supposed to split in half, as if Ross’s shot had somehow broken the goal!
But this didn’t go to plan. Ross hit her penalty wide of the goal but the goal still broke in half!
The World Cup started with a missed penalty and ended with one as well as Italy’s Roberto Baggio missed the crucial kick in the Final against Brazil.
About Author
