India, June 11 -- The biggest World Cup in history is upon us. Come Thursday (IST), the 2026 FIFA World Cup will kick off at the Estadio Azteca in Mexico City. And before a ball has even been kicked, the tournament has already generated enough drama, controversy and expectation to command global attention, more often for reasons beyond football itself.

Forty-eight nations. Three host countries. One hundred and four matches. Thirty-nine days. And a world that is simultaneously more football-mad and more politically fractured than ever before.

When Mexico face South Africa in a repeat of the 2010 World Cup opener on June 11 at the Azteca, a stadium becoming the first to host World Cup matches across three different editions, it will mark ...