On: World Cup Teams Are in a Race for AI Dominance

June 25, 2026.

They have turned the pitch into a laboratory, and the players into data points. FIFA’s offer of a universal AI agent is presented as a great equalizer - a technical solution to competitive imbalance. But the illusion of neutrality is precisely that: an illusion. The wealthier teams will not content themselves with the common tool; they will build their own, finer instruments, hire their own mathematicians, and cloak their spending in the language of innovation. This is not a leveling of the field but a new form of arms race, dressed in the respectable garb of science. The beautiful game becomes a beauty contest of another kind - one where victory goes not to the side with the most spirit or skill, but to the one that best anticipates what the others will do. And in that cold calculus, something essential is lost: the animal spirits of the game itself, the sheer unpredictability that makes it worth watching. In the long run, we may all have perfectly optimized teams, but in the short run, we are killing the joy.