It won’t just be the match that will award the World Cup. On Sunday 19 July the final between Spain and Argentina will transform the New York New Jersey Stadium, the name used by FIFA for the MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, into one of the biggest television and music stages of the year. For the first time in the history of the tournament, in fact, the show will not stop at the traditional ceremony preceding kick-off, but will enter directly into the match with a real halftime show organized during the interval.
It is a choice that inevitably brings the World Cup closer to the Super Bowl model and which speaks well of the direction taken by FIFA for the first edition of the competition played by 48 national teams. The final is no longer presented simply as the culminating moment of international football, but as a global event capable of bringing together sport, music, entertainment and social initiatives in front of an audience that goes far beyond that of fans. Spain and Argentina will compete on the field; Some of the most important names in contemporary pop culture will take turns around the match.
To follow the evening correctly, however, it is necessary to distinguish two different events, often brought together imprecisely in the graphics and posts circulated on social media. Before the final, the closing ceremony will take place, with Post Malone, Laura Pausini, Robbie Williams, Nicole Scherzinger and other guests; during the interval the show will arrive with Madonna, Shakira, Justin Bieber and BTS. Laura Pausini, therefore, will be among the protagonists of the day, but will not be part of the halftime show.
The first halftime show in the history of the World Cup final
Madonna, Shakira, Justin Bieber and BTS have been officially announced by FIFA as co-headliners of the first FIFA World Cup Final Halftime Show. It is not a simple succession of guests included in the show of a single artist, but of four protagonists placed on the same level within a cast that spans different generations, markets and cultural areas.
Madonna brings with her over forty years of pop history and an almost unprecedented ability to transform music into imagery. Shakira has already linked her name to the World Cup with Waka Wakawhich has become one of the most recognizable songs in the competition’s history, while Justin Bieber continues to be one of the most popular and influential pop artists of his generation. Alongside them are BTS, today the biggest pop and K-pop group in the world, in the midst of an international tour that is filling stadiums.
Their presence does not need to be described as a consecration granted by the West or as the entry of K-pop into a space from which it had been excluded. BTS are naturally part of this billboard because they have long belonged to the highest level of the global music industry and because, between sales, streaming, ability to mobilize the public and size of the concerts, they are one of the few names capable of supporting an event of this magnitude. The 41 North American and European dates of BTS World Tour “ARIRANG” they had already sold out at the beginning of the year, while the tour, which started in April from South Korea, is now passing through stadiums and cities all over the world.
There is therefore no need to insist on the surprise of seeing them next to Madonna, Shakira and Bieber: they are the best in the world in their field and it is perfectly logical that they are there. The interesting fact, if anything, is the photography offered by the cast chosen by FIFA, in which Korean pop no longer represents a separate category to be explained to the public, but one of the central components of the international music market.
The group of four co-headliners will be joined by Burna Boy, Venezuelan conductor Gustavo Dudamel and the PS22 Chorus with Coldplay. Some characters will also be present Sesame Street and the Muppets, included in the show to strengthen its connection with the FIFA Global Citizen Education Fund, the project that aims to raise 100 million dollars to expand access to education and football opportunities for children. The creative direction is entrusted to Chris Martin of Coldplay, while the production is handled by Global Citizen together with Live Nation and Done + Dusted.
Before the match there are Post Malone and Laura Pausini
The halftime show will be preceded by another major production. The closing ceremony of the World Cup will begin at 1.30 pm local time, corresponding to 7.30pm Italianthat is, ninety minutes before kick-off of the final. Post Malone has been chosen as the headliner of the show, which will also feature Laura Pausini, Robbie Williams, Nicole Scherzinger and IShowSpeed, while Tom Cruise is expected to make a special appearance. Just before the game, Jennifer Hudson will perform the US national anthem.
Laura Pausini will therefore be one of the central figures of the ceremony who will accompany the public towards the final, within a show designed in collaboration with Balich Wonder Studio. It is also an important step for Italy, which will be represented on the most watched stage of the day before attention shifts to the match and, subsequently, to the halftime show.
The distinction between the two moments is simple: Pausini, Post Malone and the other artists of the ceremony will perform before 9pm; Madonna, Shakira, Justin Bieber and BTS will instead take to the stage during the half-time of Spain-Argentina. The whole day was constructed as one big television story, but the two shows have different casts, times and functions.
What time does the halftime show start in Italy
Spain-Argentina will start on Sunday 19 July at 21 Italianwhen it will be 3pm in East Rutherford. The final will be commented on Rai by Alberto Rimedio and Lele Adani, while on DAZN it will be included in coverage that will begin well before kick-off.
The halftime show cannot have a precise time, because its start will depend on the actual duration of the first half and the injury time granted by the referee. Under normal conditions it should start between 9.50pm and 9.55pmbut the indication necessarily remains approximate.
The musical portion will last eleven minutes, while the overall intermission will be longer than the traditional fifteen minutes to allow for the assembly and removal of the stage. According to television sources spoken to by Reuters, it will take around seven minutes to prepare the structures and a similar time to clear the pitch, bringing the overall break to around 25 minutes. It is a detail that has fueled some discussion about the effects for the players and the compatibility with the rules, but it is not necessary to turn it into the center of the story: the real novelty remains the entry of a great musical show into the World Cup final.
Where to see the final and the shows in Italy
The 2026 World Cup final will be broadcast for free on Rai 1 and streaming on RaiPlay. Rai confirmed the 9pm appointment and the pair of commentators, but in the communication consulted it did not provide detailed information on the full broadcast of the closing ceremony or the halftime show.
The entire event will also be available on DAZNwhich broadcast all 104 matches of the tournament and announced a long live broadcast starting approximately two and a half hours before the final. The platform has specified that its coverage will include the lead-up to the match and the closing ceremony at 7.30pm, therefore being the solution with the most clearly defined programming for those who want to follow the day from the first performances.
The Italian program can therefore be summarized as follows: at 7.30pm the closing ceremony will begin with Post Malone, Laura Pausini and other guests; at 21 Spain-Argentina will begin; at the end of the first half, approximately just before 10pm, it will be time for the halftime show with Madonna, Shakira, Justin Bieber, BTS and the rest of the cast.
A final designed for the whole world
FIFA arrives at the last day of the tournament with a project that openly goes beyond the boundaries of the match. The reference to the Super Bowl is evident, but the cast recounts an event that is much less American than it might seem: inside there are Madonna’s United States, Justin Bieber’s Canada, Shakira’s Colombia, BTS’s South Korea, Burna Boy’s Nigeria, Gustavo Dudamel’s Venezuela and Laura Pausini’s Italy.
It is a geography of contemporary pop in which markets are no longer ordered according to the old hierarchies and in which Korean music permanently occupies the center of the international scene. Madonna, Shakira, Justin Bieber and BTS come from different backgrounds, but they have been chosen to speak to the same global audience, in front of an audience that could be among the largest ever reached by a television music show.
In short, on Sunday evening, the match will remain the heart of the final, but it will no longer be the only event. First there will be Laura Pausini, then Spain and Argentina will arrive and, during the interval, four of the biggest names in world pop will take the same stage. For FIFA it is an unprecedented experiment; for the spectators, a final that will begin long before kick-off and which will not stop even when the teams return to the changing rooms.
