Of the 21 World Cups held before Qatar 2022, 12 were won by European countries, and those spoils have been shared by just five nations: Germany, Italy, France, England and Spain.
Unbeknownst to many French fans, the origin story of football on Europe's mainland, started down the road, in neighboring Belgium. The very first recorded kickabout outside of the UK, where the game was founded, took place at a college in Melle, just outside of Ghent.
In 1863, an Irish student called Cyril Bernard Morrogh came to the school "with his football under his arm, as a small very shy boy – but after a few weeks, a very popular boy, because he was the one who introduced football," according to College Melle headmaster Jan De Gendt.
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"There's history in this school, everywhere, in every corner, and from the very beginning, sports have been very important," says De Gendt. "You can't not be proud of a school like this, where everybody breathes history and lives day by day with this history."
The love of football is still going strong at the college, with classes starting, and finishing early to allow students to watch World Cup action from Qatar. "Let's be realistic," laughs De Gendt, "it's not possible to teach when Belgium is playing."
Football is a game of two halves... and so is Belgium, where Walloons and Flemish bond over the game. /CGTN
Forty years after Morrogh brought the beautiful game to Melle, France and Belgium's national teams met for both country's first international match. The game in 1904 was the seventh recorded international game and ended as a draw, with both teams scoring three goals.
Nearly 120 years later, the legacy of that historic moment continues to be central to Belgian society.
"The world is so small these days – when we were growing up, it seemed much bigger – but to think about that happening back then is a remarkable thing," muses Paul Staunton, director of football for Ireland FC, a team of Irish expats playing in amateur Belgian football leagues.
Irish-Belgian bond
For Staunton, Morrogh's story strengthens the bond that Irish football fans living in Belgium feel with the country.
"We find that through football you don't know who you're going to play with or against, or where they're from or what their backstory is, they're from all over the world, it's really a fantastic thing about it and to hear that story is really something else, it's very very interesting for us."
Football also holds a crucial unifying role in the small kingdom, bringing the country's Flemish-speaking Flanders and French-speaking Walloon regions together behind one team.
"One of the stakes for this national team, beyond the competition itself, is political," says Xavier Breuil, a historian at the University of Franche-Comté who specializes in Belgian football.
"It's the belief of a country in its football team. Nowadays, the last thing linking the Flemish and the Walloons is the Belgian national football team – so if it garners support, it means the country will stay together for a few more years."
Football's irresistible global rise has made it the world's most popular sport, counting more than a third of the world's population as fans.
While the sport is now a global political phenomenon, the story of European football has humble roots, starting with a kickabout between a few schoolkids in a field in Melle.