A Brazilian reporter called it “organized disorganization.” The Netherlands had music, and the one who carried the melody, keeping so many simultaneous notes on pitch and in tune, was Johan Cruyff. Conducting the orchestra and playing his own instrument at the same time, Cruyff worked harder than anyone.
This scrawny live wire earned a spot on the Ajax roster when he was only a child: while his mother waited tables at the club bar, he collected balls that went off the field, shined the players’ shoes, and placed the flags in the corners. He did everything they asked of him and nothing they ordered him to do. He wanted to play and they would not let him because his body was too weak and his will too strong. When they finally gave him a chance, he took it and never let it go. Still a boy, he made his debut, played stupendously, scored a goal, and knocked out the referee with one punch.
From that night on he kept up his reputation for being tempestuous, hardworking, and talented. Over two decades he won twenty-two championships in the Netherlands and Spain. He retired when he was thirty-seven; after scoring his final goal, the crowd carried him on its shoulders from the stadium to his house.
Müller
The coach of Club TSV in Munich told him, “You won’t go far in soccer. Better try something else.”
Back then, Gerd Müller worked twelve hours a day in a textile mill.
Eleven years later, in 1974, this stumpy tub of a player was champion of the world. No one scored more goals than he in the history of either the German league or the national team.
Disguised as an old woman, his fangs and claws hidden, the wild wolf on the field strolled along unseen, making a show of showering innocent passes and other works of charity. Meanwhile, he slipped unnoticed into the box. The net was the bridal veil of an irresistible girl. In front of the open goal he licked his chops. And in one fell swoop he stood naked, then bit.
Havelange
In 1974, after a long climb, Jean-Marie Faustin Goedefroid de Havelange reached FIFA’s summit. And he announced: “I have come to sell a product named soccer.”
From that point on, Havelange has exercised absolute power over the world of soccer. His body glued to the throne, Havelange reigns in his palace in Zurich surrounded by a court of voracious technocrats. He governs more countries than the United Nations, travels more than the Pope, and has more medals than any war hero.
Havelange was born in Brazil, where he owns Cometa, the country’s largest bus and trucking company, and other businesses specializing in financial speculation, weapons sales, and life insurance. But his opinions do not seem very Brazilian. A journalist from The Times of London once asked him: “What do you like best about soccer? The glory? The beauty? The poetry? Winning?”
And he answered: “The discipline.”
This old-style monarch has transformed the geography of soccer and made it into one of the more splendid multinational businesses in the world. Under his rule, the number of countries competing in world championships has doubled: there were sixteen in 1974, and there will be thirty-two as of 1998. And from what we can decipher through the fog around his balance sheets, the profits generated by these tournaments have multiplied so prodigiously that the biblical miracle of bread and fish seems like a joke in comparison.
The new protagonists of world soccer — countries in Africa, the Middle East, and Asia — offer Havelange a broad base of support, but his power gains sustenance, above all, from his association with several gigantic corporations, Coca-Cola and Adidas among them. It was Havelange who convinced Adidas to finance the candidacy of his friend Juan Antonio Samaranch for the presidency of the International Olympic Committee in 1980. Samaranch, who during the Franco dictatorship had the good sense to wear a blue shirt and salute with his palm extended, is now the other king of world sport. These two manage enormous sums of money. How much, no one knows. They are rather bashful about the subject.
The Owners of the Ball
FIFA, which holds court in Zurich, the International Olympic Committee, which rules from Lausanne, and the company ISL Marketing, whose orders issue from Lucerne, manage the World Cup and the Olympics. All three of these powerful organizations maintain their head offices in Switzerland, a country famous for William Tell’s marksmanship, precision watches, and religious devotion to bank secrecy. Coincidentally, all three profess an extraordinary degree of modesty when it comes to the money that passes through their hands, and the money that in their hands remains.
ISL Marketing owns exclusive rights over stadium advertising, films and videos, logos, banners, and mascots for international soccer competitions until the end of the century. This business belongs to the heirs of Adolf Dassler, founder of Adidas, brother and enemy of the founder of its competitor Puma. When Havelange and Samaranch offered a sales monopoly to the Dassler family, they were acting out of gratitude, a noble sentiment. Adidas, the largest sports clothing manufacturer in the world, had shown considerable generosity when it came to helping them consolidate their own personal power. In 1990, the Dasslers sold Adidas to French businessman Bernard Tapie, but held on to ISL, which the family runs in association with the Japanese advertising firm Dentsu.
Control over world sport is no small potatoes. At the end of 1994, speaking in New York to a business association, Havelange confessed a few numbers, something he rarely does: “I can confirm that soccer generates a total of $225 billion worldwide every year.” He boasted that such a fortune compared favorably to the $136 billion in sales that General Motors, the world’s largest multinational corporation, recorded in 1993.
In the same speech Havelange warned, “Soccer is a commercial product that must be sold as wisely as possible.” And he cited the first law of wisdom in today’s world: “You have to pay a lot of attention to the packaging.”
The sale of television rights is the most productive vein in the fantastically rich mine of international competitions, and FIFA and the International Olympic Committee enjoy the lion’s share of the proceeds. That money has multiplied spectacularly since television began to broadcast world championships live around the world. The 1993 Barcelona Olympics earned 630 times as much from television as the Rome Olympics in 1960, when the broadcast did not reach beyond the national market.
When it comes to choosing the advertisers for each tournament, Havelange, Samaranch, and the Dassler family never quarrel. The machine that turns every passion into money cannot afford the luxury of promoting the most healthy or useful products for active sports fans. They simply place themselves at the service of the highest bidder, and they only want to know if MasterCard will pay more than Visa, and if Fujifilm will put more money on the table than Kodak. Coca-Cola, that nutritious elixir no athlete’s body can do without, always heads the list. Its wealth of virtues places it beyond question.
With fin de siècle soccer so wrapped up in marketing and sponsors, it’s no surprise that some of Europe’s biggest clubs are actually companies that belong to other companies. Juventus from Turin, just like Fiat, is part of the Agnelli Group. Milan belongs to the constellation of three hundred companies of the Berlusconi Group. Parma belongs to Parmalat. Sampdoria, to the oil conglomerate Mantovani. Fiorentina, to the movie production company Cecchi Gori. Olympique de Marseilles moved to the forefront of European soccer when it became one of Bernard Tapie’s companies, until a bribery scandal ruined his successful career. Paris Saint-Germain belongs to the television firm Canal Plus. Sochaux’s sponsor, Peugeot, also owns the club stadium. Philips owns the Dutch club PSV in Eindhoven. Bayer is the name of the two German first-division clubs the company finances: Bayer Leverkusen and Bayer Uerdingen. The inventor and owner of Amstrad computers is also the proprietor of the British club Tottenham Hotspur, whose shares are traded on the stock exchange. Blackburn Rovers belongs to Walkersteel magnate Jack Walker.