Intro for May 14, 2026

Dear Gossips,

For the first time ever, FIFA will present a halftime show during the World Cup final on July 19 at Met Life Stadium in New Jersey, benefiting “the FIFA Global Citizen Education Fund, a landmark initiative working to raise USD $100 million to expand access to quality education and football for children worldwide”.

This was actually previously announced weeks ago in March, that Chris Martin would be curating the performance, but I’m not sure anyone was paying much attention. It’s headline news now, though, because the tournament starts in less than a month and because, obviously, they’ve announced the artists: Madonna, Shakira, and BTS.

This is great timing for the Queen of Pop since her new album, Confessions II, drops two weeks before the final match. Shakira, of course, is one of the artists most closely associated with the World Cup for almost 20 years, with “Waka Waka (This Time for Africa)” as the official theme song for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa; and this year a new song called “Dai Dai” with Burna Boy, releasing tomorrow, is the theme song for the 2026 World Cup. It’s VERY catchy.

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A post shared by Shakira (@shakira)

As for BTS, there are strong connections here too. They’ve always been philanthropic, and the charitable goals of the World Cup halftime show meet their brand ethos. Plus they’ve been friends with Chris and Coldplay for a long time and they’ve topped the Billboard Hot 100 together with their song “My Universe”. That’s probably an easy prop bet for what tracks will be performed during the set.

Football is the most-watched, most popular sport on the planet, and the World Cup is the biggest sporting event in the world. The 2022 World Cup final was watched by almost 1.5 BILLION people so they’re aiming to match those kinds of numbers with artists that have universal appeal. BTS, like Madonna and Shakira, have fans in every corner of the globe. And, currently, have the biggest selling album of the year so far, supported by a massive world tour.

Speaking of the tour, RM, Jin, Suga, j-hope, Jimin, V, and Jung Kook are in Paris for two shows right before the World Cup final. So it’s looking like they’ll wrap up the concert on Saturday 18 July and get right on the PJ to get to New York to get in a couple of soundchecks and rehearse ahead of the game on Sunday. I’m curious to see how this halftime show will incorporate all these artists in what will likely be a 15-minute performance, tops. Will they literally be singing with Madonna and Shakira for the first time in rehearsal 12 hours before showtime? The inside baseball logistics of this is what I really want to know.

Attached - Shakira performing last week in Brazil.

Yours in gossip,

Lainey