The World Cup is the most watched sports event glob­ally. The 2022 World Cup was one of the most impact­ful and event­ful World Cups tour­na­ments in history. Morocco, the under­dog, made it to the semi-finals, and Argentina, having a slow start, picked up and with the lead­er­ship of Lionel Messi, and went on to win the finals.

The team that brought all of Justice High School together, Morocco, had one of the great­est upsets in World Cup history. Morocco was seeded 19^th out of the 32 teams that partic­i­pated, plac­ing Morocco firmly in the bottom half of the teams. Despite this, Morocco managed to claw their way to a 4^th place finish, a remark­able achieve­ment. Sopho­more Sidi Mohamed Mouatas­sim El Alaoui was root­ing for Morocco because “that’s where I’m from and we were really good this year.” When asked how he felt when Morocco was play­ing during school, El Alaoui said, “When there was a game going on, you could feel [the energy]. A ton of people were root­ing for Morocco so that felt nice.” Justice students, Moroc­can or not, came together in support of the team that defied all expec­ta­tions and had a fantas­tic show­ing for their country.

The 2022 World Cup finals were a game for the ages. The final­ists, France and Argentina were fierce competi­tors, making for an outstand­ing game. Justice French teacher Abdjelil Bemmer­zouk said he “was cheer­ing for France the whole time.” When asked what he thought of France’s perfor­mance, Bemmer­zouk said, “I think [France] played a good game, but because of all the injuries, the team was not at their best poten­tial.” 
Justice senior Luis Herbah is an Argen­tin­ian student that was support­ing Argentina during the World Cup. Herbah was thrilled with the Argen­tin­ian victory. “It was a very happy moment for me and my family. Seeing Messi and Argentina win the World Cup for the first time in around 40 years was fantas­tic, we cele­brated all day,” said Herbah.