The first thing you noticed was not the referee’s whistle. It was the sound. From the Norwegian stands came the deep, rhythmic Viking "vroom" — the chant that has become the signature of Norwegian football supporters. A slow, powerful roar echoes around the stadium, carrying the spirit of a small nation that has always believed courage can challenge giants. The Vikings had arrived.

By Nadia Ahmad
They did not come with England’s football history or the weight of one of the world’s biggest sporting cultures. They came with their voices, their colours and the belief that, for ninety minutes, football should belong to those who fight for it on the pitch.

But after the dramatic England–Norway encounter, many Norwegian supporters were left with a feeling familiar to smaller nations: that when they enter the world of football’s most powerful institutions, they are not only competing against eleven players.

They are entering a system.

Within minutes of the final whistle, the debate was no longer only about football. It was about trust. About technology. About decisions made far away from the supporters who fill stadiums and turn football into the world’s greatest spectacle.

Whether every controversial decision was right or wrong became almost secondary. The deeper issue was that millions of fans no longer automatically believe that the institutions governing football are neutral. And when an organisation loses that basic confidence, every disputed moment becomes a political symbol.

For many Europeans, FIFA has become more than a football federation. It has become a symbol of something larger: the rise of powerful global institutions that operate above national borders, speak the language of international cooperation, but often appear distant from the ordinary people affected by their decisions.

This is why the anger surrounding FIFA is not only about one match, one referee or one tournament. It is about a question that has spread across Europe in recent years: who really controls the institutions that shape our lives?

FIFA would reject the comparison immediately. It would point to elections, congresses and member associations. But its critics see something different: a pyramid of power in which decisions flow from the top, the centre remains protected, and the voices at the bottom struggle to be heard.

In an age when voters across Europe have challenged political establishments and demanded more accountability from distant institutions, FIFA has remained remarkably resistant to that same pressure.

The word "Stalinist" is deliberately provocative. It does not mean that FIFA is a political regime, nor that football officials are ideological followers of Stalin. The comparison is about a style of power that belongs to another century: a highly centralised pyramid in which authority flows downward and accountability struggles to rise.

The Soviet system built a world where the centre knew best. Decisions came from the top, institutions protected themselves, and ordinary people were expected to accept the wisdom of those above them. Critics of FIFA argue that they recognise a similar pattern in the way world football is governed: a small circle of decision-makers, a complex bureaucracy, and a distance between those who run the game and those who love it.

FIFA was not created in the Stalin era. It was founded in 1904, long before the rise of Soviet power. But during the twentieth century, like many international organisations, it developed a structure shaped by the age of large bureaucracies, centralised administration and powerful institutions operating beyond traditional national borders.

Today, FIFA is one of the most influential organisations on Earth. It organises the biggest sporting event in the world, controls billions in revenue, and can bring together nations that disagree on almost everything else. Yet its internal structure remains far removed from the democratic expectations that many Europeans have come to demand from powerful institutions.

A fan can vote for a government. A supporter can change his club. A citizen can protest against a political leader. But the ordinary football fan has almost no direct influence over the people who decide the future of the game he loves.

That is the paradox of modern football: the sport itself has become more open than ever, but the institution above it still feels like a closed world.

Every four years, billions of people watch the World Cup. They create the atmosphere, buy the shirts, fill the stadiums and transform football into a global language. But when controversy arrives, the final word belongs not to the fans, but to committees, officials and administrators far away from the noise of the terraces.

The headquarters are in Zurich, but the power feels almost royal.

FIFA does not have a king. Yet over the decades, the image of the powerful president surrounded by officials, ceremonies and international meetings has created something that resembles a court. Leaders come and go, promises of reform arrive, scandals fade, but the institution itself remains.

This is why some critics describe FIFA as a football monarchy wearing the clothes of a modern organisation.

The irony is that football itself was never designed to belong to kings. It was born in streets, schools and working-class neighbourhoods. It belongs to the child kicking a ball in a European square, the fan standing in the rain outside a stadium, and the family watching a national team together.

Yet above this democratic passion sits one of the most centralised institutions in global sport.

And this is where Norway’s Viking story becomes bigger than one match.

The Viking has always represented the challenger — the smaller force sailing toward a powerful kingdom, believing courage can defeat size.

But in modern football, the battle is no longer only between teams.

It is also between supporters and the institutions that claim to represent them.

For many Europeans, FIFA has become a symbol of a larger battle taking place far beyond football. Across the continent, millions of voters have grown suspicious of institutions that operate across borders and present themselves as guardians of international cooperation, while appearing increasingly distant from ordinary citizens.

This is the criticism often directed at the modern global system: that decisions affecting millions are increasingly made by people who are not directly accountable to the people they affect.

FIFA represents this debate in its purest form. Its supporters argue that football must remain above national politics, that a global sport needs a global organisation, and that international cooperation is the only way to bring together nations with different histories, cultures and interests.

Its critics answer that globalisation without accountability creates institutions that become too powerful, too comfortable and too distant.

The controversy surrounding Norway was therefore not only about a ball, a decision or a referee's whistle. It became another chapter in a much bigger story: the struggle between global institutions and the people who feel they have lost their voice inside them.

Every crisis at FIFA follows a familiar script. Questions appear. Promises of reform are announced. New committees are created. Leaders speak about transparency and a new beginning. Then, with time, the anger fades, and the machine continues.

That is why the biggest problem facing FIFA today may not be one controversial decision. It is trust.

An institution can survive criticism. It can survive protests. It can even survive scandals. But when supporters begin to believe that the system is designed to protect itself first, every future controversy becomes harder to explain away.

The tragedy is that football itself remains one of humanity’s greatest examples of connection. A small country like Norway can stand on the same pitch as England. A child from any continent can dream of wearing the same shirt as the game's legends. For ninety minutes, borders disappear.

But above that beautiful simplicity stands an organisation that many fans see as complicated, distant and untouchable.

The Viking spirit that arrived in the stadium was not only Norway's. It represented something many Europeans recognise: the desire of smaller voices to be heard by larger powers.

FIFA does not need to become smaller. Football is now a global phenomenon and requires coordination across borders. But it does need to become closer to the people who give it life.

Because football's greatest strength was never its committees, its offices or its ceremonies, it was always the people.

The fans who travel thousands of kilometres. The families who watch every tournament together. The supporters who believe, sometimes against all odds, that the game should be decided on the pitch and not somewhere far away from it.

The Viking may have left the battlefield disappointed. But his question remains: In the modern age of global football, who does the game truly belong to?