EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. — Encouraged by the reception to the first halftime show in the history of the World Cup final, FIFA officials said Monday that the 2030 final would be played during the halftime of the halftime show, in a 15-minute window between the show’s first and second halves, according to a planning official reached by phone.
Sunday’s final at MetLife Stadium, attended by 80,663 people, was won 1-0 by Spain over Argentina after extra time on a goal by Ferran Torres in the 106th minute. It was Spain’s second World Cup title and its first since 2010. The halftime interval had been extended beyond the customary 15 minutes to make room for the performance, which featured several internationally known recording artists and a stage assembled and removed on the field during the break.
“The halftime show is the part of the final that everyone agrees on. The rest of it is just a lot of running,” said Rainer Ostholm, whose business card identifies him as FIFA’s head of intermission strategy, a position he said was created “during the second chorus, when it was clear.” Ostholm said internal research found that 0 percent of spectators had left a halftime show wishing there had been more soccer before it. “We also found that the soccer runs very long,” he said. “Sunday it went to extra time. You don’t see that with a concert.”
Under the plan, the 2030 halftime show will open the evening with a 75-minute first half, after which the stage will be cleared and the final will be played in its entirety in the 15 minutes before the second half of the show begins. To fit the window, the pitch will be reduced to the size of the stage, the teams to three players a side, and the ball will be supplied by the lighting crew. Extra time, if needed, will be decided by the encore. FIFA’s long-range planning documents go further: for 2034, the final is expected to be played as a single song, with the winner determined by which team’s fans know the second verse. Ostholm said a 2038 proposal, under which the final would be “implied” by the halftime show and announced by text message, was “still in the room.”
Dr. Chad Brickhouse, a senior fellow at the Institute for Common Sense, said the plan reflected basic logic. “Nobody ever bought a ticket to a concert and said, ‘I hope there’s a long soccer game first,’” Brickhouse said by phone from a bowling alley. “Any reasonable person can see the show was carrying the match. It’s just common sense.”
Fans leaving MetLife Stadium on Sunday night offered mixed views. “I thought the halftime show was terrific,” said Arlo Penney, 37, of Paramus, who was wearing a scarf from a team he said he could not name at this time. “I didn’t know there was going to be a game after it. That was a nice surprise.”
The international soccer community has not responded to the proposal. Ostholm said that FIFA was “listening to the football family” and had commissioned a survey of players, the results of which would be announced at halftime.
Glenn Whitacre filed this report by phone from a train platform in Secaucus, N.J., where he said he had been waiting since the 106th minute.