The World Cup is undoubtedly one of the most popular sporting events around. It is enjoyed and celebrated on every corner of the Earth. Every 4 years, people from all races, backgrounds and walks of life come together to root for their favorite teams. For the 2018 World Cup, 209 different nations entered the qualifying process, and 32 teams from all over the globe made their way to Russia to participate. That means players, coaches, staff and referees all speaking different languages (18 official languages!), living and working together during the entire event.

FIFA (Fédération Internationale de Football Association) announced that there were 3.2 billion viewers for the 2014 World Cup spanning almost 200 countries and 180 different languages. 2018 is set to break that number, so the language barrier goes far beyond the players, coaches and officiating staff at the games. When it comes to the media, every country must deal with the language issue while covering the games, whether it be televised or written.

To tackle the tremendous language barrier there is only one solution: professional interpreters. During the games themselves, universal body language is used by players and coaches and hand gestures are used by referees to help bridge some of the communication gap, but interpreters remain vital to the event. Aside from the games and media coverage, there are also up to 100 events and meetings that take place in a World Cup year which also require the same services.

FIFA has 4 official languages for their soccer organization: English, French, German, and Spanish. They have an entire staff of interpreters and translators focusing on these languages to help with international communication day to day, and for translating approximately 3,000,000 words per language, per year. But for the World Cup itself, the languages multiply and FIFA adds freelance interpreters contracted through their partners and agencies to take on this huge task. It is a very involved event between the plethora of languages and the fast paced, short deadline environment.

Despite all of today’s advances in automated interpretation, we continue to see that in-person and remote interpreters are still the premiere option for reliable language services. The quality, accuracy and consistency of real interpreters cannot be matched, and with a global event of such magnitude, it is always best to use the most reliable methodology. While fans may rely on machine technology like Google Translate to get by, it just cannot be trusted for professional use. Without interpreters, the World Cup just wouldn’t translate.

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Making Connections Nationwide. Interpreters Unlimited provides comprehensive foreign language and American Sign Langauge services in the United States. IU works with every major industry including, healthcare, government, education, corporate and insurance, providing high-quality language services for onsite, over-the-phone and video remote interpretation services. For more information, please call 800-726-9891 to speak with a representative.

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