‘Our team will definitely win the cup’: the Keralan support of Brazil and Argentina during Men’s World Cup 2022

Abstract

At the end of 2022, the FIFA Men’s World Cup took place in Qatar, and Argentina won its third title. Among thr worldwide supporters, India, a nation that had never played at the event, caught my attention. This study focuses on the state of Kerala, a mainly rural zone in Southwest India, and its massive support for Brazil and Argentina. After a literature review on football in India, the globalization of football, and team rivalries, the study analyzes a few English-written news articles to understand such manifestation of fandom in Kerala, and focuses on the giant cut-outs to find the answer as to why Brazil and Argentina are the teams who received the biggest support. It concludes that the said support has social, political, mediatic, identitarian, and religious roots. The article ends with the question as to how these manifestations differ in different countries, states, championships, and religions.