Fifa World Cup 2014, the month-long festival of football in the spiritual homeland of the sport gets under way with the hosts and five time champions Brazil taking on Croatia in the Arena de Sao Paulo today.
The showcase event of the beautiful game will be the highest money-spinning edition in the World Cup history with the amount of prize money amounting to a whopping $358m. The winners get $35m while the runners-up will take away $25m, the third placed team $22m, the fourth placed team $20m, the quarter-finalists $14m, the round of 16 qualifiers $9m and the group stage teams $8m.
It is worth mentioning here in this regard that for the the prize money for the winners of 2002 edition of this mega football event hosted jointly by Japan and South Korea was just $14.2m which means there has been an increase of more than hundred percent in the winners’ prize money after just 12 years.
However, that’s not the end of the story. Fifa World Cup 2014 is poised for such an expensive event that all the 32 participating nations will receive $1.5m each for taking part and team preparation which means it will cost Fifa $48m. Fifa have not forgot to honor the clubs whose players will take part in the World Cup and will splash out a further $70m as a recognition of their participation in the competition.
The opening ceremony will see Pitbull, Claudia Leitte, Jennifer Lopez and Olodum grace the ceremony with their thrilling performances. The manifestation of Brazil’s three biggest treasures – its nature, people and football will be showcased by a total of 600 dancers and performers with the focus being a “living” ball. This LED ball has more than 90,000 light clusters creating 7,000 nits of luminance which should enliven the performance. The opening ceremony, which is set to be attended by 12 heads of state along with the United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, will also feature a demonstration by the Walk Again Project.
In addition to the 62,606 fans and dignitaries present in the stadium, the ceremony will also be telecast in 200 territories around the world with more than 160 principal rights holders broadcasting the spectacular event to all four corners of the globe.
The 61,606-capacity stadium is one of the 12 World Cup stadiums which were supposed to be ready by the end of last December. However, construction work missed the deadline of delivery six times and was still going through the final touches on Wednesday. The workers were busily checking beams, tightening different structures and installing wire just a day before the opener.
Japanese referee Yuichi Nishimura will handle the opening game and an interesting fact worth a special attention here is that the 42 year old was also in-charge when Brazil lost to the Netherlands in the quarter-finals of Fifa World Cup 2010 in South Africa. He is remembered for sending off Brazil’s Felipe Melo for stamping on Arjen Robben as the Brazilians surrendered an 1-0 lead to lose 2-1 which also cost Brazil’s coach Dunga his job.
