Dallas Stadium witnessed World Cup history
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Lionel Messi came to Arlington twice this tournament. Photo: Rico Brouwer/Soccrates/Getty Images
Dallas Stadium's nine World Cup matches introduced Lionel Messi, Harry Kane, Jude Bellingham, Erling Haaland, Cristiano Ronaldo, Mohamed Salah, Lamine Yamal and Kylian Mbappé — and their large fan followings — to North Texas.
What they're saying: "To get the greatest global stars in our home community, we hit it out of the park," FC Dallas president Dan Hunt said Monday. Hunt was chairman of the Dallas Bid Committee and co-chair of the North Texas World Cup Organizing Committee.
- "There was a whole lot of hard work to get us to nine games, and then it worked out almost perfectly," he said.
Our World Cup highlights:
🇪🇸 Spain won the last game at Dallas Stadium Tuesday, a resounding 2-0 defeat of France, sending the team to the World Cup final and tying the record for the most consecutive games without a loss.
🎤 Wonderwall: England's World Cup tradition got its start at Dallas Stadium in the early stages of the tournament. The team is still alive and plays Argentina in their semifinal Wednesday.
🥅 Lionel Messi's World Cup record: Almost 25.9 terabytes of data went through Dallas Stadium when Messi became the lone top goal scorer in World Cup history, says Chad Estis, AT&T Stadium's executive VP of business operations.
👑 High-profile visitors: The matches brought King Abdullah of Jordan, Portugal Prime Minister Luís Montenegro and Japan's Princess Takamado to North Texas. One of those visits led to conversations between a large Jordanian company and a North Texas company on how they can collaborate, Arlington Mayor Jim Ross said.
😳 Egypt and Norway's historic wins: Norway defeated Ivory Coast in their round of 32 match, advancing to the round of 16 for the first time ever. Egypt did the same, after defeating Australia in a thrilling match that went into extra time and then penalty kicks.
🐐 Ronaldo's last dance: Arlington hosted Cristiano Ronaldo's last World Cup match. Ronaldo said he was closing his World Cup era with "a calm conscience" after Spain knocked Portugal out of the tournament.