{"id":11080,"date":"2026-07-20T02:18:07","date_gmt":"2026-07-19T21:18:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=11080"},"modified":"2026-07-20T02:18:07","modified_gmt":"2026-07-19T21:18:07","slug":"tom-cruise-gives-dramatic-speech-before-world-cup-final","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=11080","title":{"rendered":"Tom Cruise Gives Dramatic Speech Before World Cup Final"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div id=\"post-body\">\n<p><strong>Tom Cruise<\/strong> did his best to inspire the crowd before the Spain-Argentina World Cup final on Sunday with a dramatic speech about how soccer \u2014 or football as hardcore fans insist on calling it \u2014 brings people from all over the globe together.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is football. This is unity,\u201d Cruise declared, while lifting up his sunglasses and gesturing to the fans in MetLife Stadium. \u201cAnd this \u2014 this is greatness.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The <em>Top Gun: Maverick<\/em> star\u2019s address was broadcast by Telemundo and Fox in the States. A cinematic soundtrack played in the background as Cruise spoke on the field, which apparently added to the emotional lead-up to the big match.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cFootball is a language spoken without words, a force that unites people,\u201d Cruise said a moment earlier in his pep talk. \u201cThat turns strangers into friends and reminds us of what we ALL have in common,\u2019<\/p>\n<p>Cruise then broke out a little bit of Spanish to honor the two finalists, \u201cEspana y Argentina.\u201d But he said the memories from the 2026 World Cup will be shared forever by \u201ceach and every one of us.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Hollywood icon gave the speech during a star-studded Sunday in New Jersey. President<strong> Donald Trump<\/strong> and First Lady <strong>Melania Trump<\/strong> attended the match, and stars <a href=\"https:\/\/www.townandcountrymag.com\/leisure\/sporting\/a72063173\/celebrities-world-cup-finals-2026-photos\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">like<\/a> <strong>Kevin Hart<\/strong>, <strong>Timoth\u00e9e Chalamet<\/strong>, and<strong> Kylie Jenner<\/strong>, were there; <strong>Madonna<\/strong>, <strong>Shakira<\/strong>, <strong>Justin Bieber<\/strong> and BTS performed at halftime, while sports stars like Knicks guard <strong>Jalen Brunson\u00a0<\/strong>and 7-time Super Bowl champ <strong>Tom Brady<\/strong> were also spotted.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.mediaite.com\/media\/sports\/trump-appears-to-get-booed-at-world-cup\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Trump<\/a> told Fox before the match he\u00a0didn\u2019t want to pick a side\u2026 but he also couldn\u2019t see himself putting money on Spain, considering Argentina had legend <b>Lionel Messi<\/b>\u00a0leading the way.<\/p>\n<p class=\"qualified qualified-1\">\u201cI knew you were gonna ask, I thought about it a lot\u2026 I hate to get involved, even though politically it doesn\u2019t matter so much. The head of Argentina is a friend of mine, he\u2019s done a terrific job,\u201d <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mediaite.com\/media\/sports\/hard-to-bet-against-messi-trump-dishes-world-cup-prediction-before-argentina-spain\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Trump said<\/a>. \u201cBut I would say that it\u2019s hard to bet against Messi.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Watch above via Telemundo.<\/p>\n<p><em><strong>New: The Mediaite One-Sheet &#8220;Newsletter of Newsletters&#8221;<\/strong><br \/>Your daily summary and analysis of what the many, many media newsletters are saying and reporting. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mediaite.com\/subscribe\">Subscribe now!<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><script type=\"text\/javascript\">\n!function(f,b,e,v,n,t,s){if(f.fbq)return;n=f.fbq=function(){n.callMethod?\nn.callMethod.apply(n,arguments):n.queue.push(arguments)};if(!f._fbq)f._fbq=n;\nn.push=n;n.loaded=!0;n.version='2.0';n.queue=[];t=b.createElement(e);t.async=!0;\nt.src=v;s=b.getElementsByTagName(e)[0];s.parentNode.insertBefore(t,s)}(window,\ndocument,'script','https:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/fbevents.js');\n<\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Tom Cruise did his best to inspire the crowd before the Spain-Argentina World Cup final on Sunday with a dramatic speech about how soccer \u2014 or football as hardcore fans insist on calling it \u2014 brings people from all over the globe together. \u201cThis is football. This is unity,\u201d Cruise declared, while lifting up his&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11081,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.mediaite.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/cru-scaled.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11080","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-newsweek-trending"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11080","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11080"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11080\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/11081"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11080"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11080"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11080"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}