The half-time break at Sunday’s World Cup final could stretch to 30 minutes, as football’s governing body pushes ahead with a Super Bowl-style interval show despite the practice breaching the sport’s own rules, The Telegraph reports.
According to the report, broadcasters BBC and ITV are preparing for the extended break, which would combine an 11-minute performance segment with their standard 15 minutes of pundit analysis.
The Laws of the Game cap any match interval at 15 minutes, but FIFA already exceeded that limit at last year’s Club World Cup, when half-time ran for 25 minutes, the newspaper said.
FIFA is reportedly aiming to build a half-time spectacle comparable to the Super Bowl’s, and broadcasters expect Sunday’s break to run even longer, potentially making the final the longest edition of the tournament’s showpiece match on record.
The Telegraph also noted that three-minute hydration breaks scheduled for each half have drawn suspicion from some quarters as a possible avenue for extra advertising.
Performers billed for the half-time show at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey include Madonna, Justin Bieber, Shakira, BTS, Burna Boy, Gustavo Dudamel and the PS22 Chorus alongside Coldplay.
A closing ceremony featuring Robbie Williams, Tom Cruise and Nicole Scherzinger is expected 90 minutes before the 8pm kick-off.
The International Football Association Board, football’s lawmaking body, had in 2021 rejected a proposal from South American confederation CONMEBOL to extend the maximum half-time interval to 25 minutes, citing concerns over the “negative impact on player welfare and safety resulting from a longer period of inactivity.”
CONMEBOL nonetheless staged a 25-minute Shakira concert during the 2024 Copa America final in Miami, a decision that drew a complaint from Colombia head coach Néstor Lorenzo, who had earlier been sanctioned at the same tournament for his team’s late return from the break, the report added.
FIFA had not responded to the Telegraph’s request for comment at the time of its report.
