The FIFA World Cup final between Spain and Argentina is living up to the hype. And to add to the festivities was a fun but odd sight in the world of association football: a halftime show.
Soccer is normally a brisk sport, but with this edition of the World Cup being co-hosted in the US (the first World Cup in the US since 1994), it’s fallen into the American Sports Entertainment Vortex™. Which isn’t a bad thing, minus the universal dislike for the hydration breaks, which many commentators have pointed out are glorified commercial breaks for the Fox network.
But given the lineup — Shakira, Madonna, BTS, and Justin Bieber, with a Sesame Street cameo and a Ted Lasso intro thrown in for good measure — the World Cup’s first-ever halftime show was just fine.
The whole thing clocked in at under six minutes, which somehow made it funnier: FIFA spent months hyping a halftime show shorter than the ad break before it. The internet noticed and acted accordingly.
Mashable Trend Report
Madonna kicks us off
Madonna’s entrance into the World Cup halftime was mostly prerecorded as she sang from her new album Confessions II. She was also seen on an ATV with Ronaldinho and R9, which was a strange sight.
This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.
This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.
This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.
This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.
This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.
BTS brings the dynamite
Probably the most anticipated performance, depending on who you ask, BTS did a quick and dirty set, performing “Dynamite” from their album BE.
This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.
This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.
This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.
Ted Lasso x Justin Bieber?
After the hype from the quick BTS appearance, Ted Lasso stars Jason Sudeikis and Brendon Hunt did a quick intro for Justin Bieber, “subbing” him into the half-time show as some much-needed heart to the game. Bieber’s song, unfortunately, slowed things down, and viewers were not kind about it.
This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.
This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.
This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.
This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.
Shakira is here
Shakira finally made her appearance alongside her FIFA World Cup theme collaborator, Burna Boy, to perform “Dai Dai.”
This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.
This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.
This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.
This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.
Topics
Sports
FIFA World Cup
PakarPBN
A Private Blog Network (PBN) is a collection of websites that are controlled by a single individual or organization and used primarily to build backlinks to a “money site” in order to influence its ranking in search engines such as Google. The core idea behind a PBN is based on the importance of backlinks in Google’s ranking algorithm. Since Google views backlinks as signals of authority and trust, some website owners attempt to artificially create these signals through a controlled network of sites.
In a typical PBN setup, the owner acquires expired or aged domains that already have existing authority, backlinks, and history. These domains are rebuilt with new content and hosted separately, often using different IP addresses, hosting providers, themes, and ownership details to make them appear unrelated. Within the content published on these sites, links are strategically placed that point to the main website the owner wants to rank higher. By doing this, the owner attempts to pass link equity (also known as “link juice”) from the PBN sites to the target website.
The purpose of a PBN is to give the impression that the target website is naturally earning links from multiple independent sources. If done effectively, this can temporarily improve keyword rankings, increase organic visibility, and drive more traffic from search results.
