Canada and the US join the World Cup action

**Alex Ritson** (0:00)
This is The Global News Podcast from the BBC World Service. I'm Alex Ritson, and in the early hours of Saturday 13 June, these are our main stories. Co-hosts Canada and the US get their World Cup campaigns underway. Elon Musk becomes the world's first trillionaire. Both US and Iranian officials have indicated that a deal to end the war is within reach.
Also, in this podcast…

**Joanna Keane** (0:34)
Spy turtles and spy fish have apparently been found swimming in a specific area, collecting what the Chinese say is sensitive data, which is then transmitted overseas using satellite.

**Alex Ritson** (0:44)
The Chinese government has accused foreign spies of attaching sensors to turtles.
We begin the podcast with the latest from the World Cup. Co-hosts Canada kicked off their tournament a few hours ago during 1-1 with Bosnia-Herzegovina in Toronto. After Mexico began proceedings at the Azteca Stadium on Thursday, it was the turn of Canada to take its place in the spotlight with an opening ceremony featuring homegrown music stars Alanis Morissette and Michael Bublé. Our reporter Jessica Murphy was in Toronto ahead of the game.

**Jessica Murphy** (1:26)
I gotta say, it's today that you really felt the buzz in this city. It was just this morning you saw a sea of Canadian fans, just a sea of red walking down this street with Chants of O Canada heading into the stadium grounds behind me. And when Canada scored that tying goal, you could hear the cheer. There was no doubt what happened.

**Alex Ritson** (1:46)
Just before we recorded this edition of the podcast, the USA completed their first match against Paraguay. It ended 4-1 to the hosts and yes, it too was preceded by another opening ceremony. This one featured Katy Perry. The famous names looking on included Tom Cruise, David Beckham and Paris Hilton. I've been speaking to our correspondent in LA, Shyamma Khalil, who gave us a sense of the atmosphere in the city before the match started.

**Shyamma Khalil** (2:18)
I am among the fans in the iconic Coliseum Stadium here in LA. This is the fan festival hub and I'm surrounded by different jerseys. A lot of red, white and blue USA jerseys, but also a lot of Mexico t-shirts.
And the ultimate fan look that I absolutely love, that I have to tell you about, was a USA fan jersey and jeans shorts and cowboy boots. Not that I can pull it off. I just thought if I were to ever want to like have a fan uniform, that would be my uniform and I've seen a couple of those and it looked great. Yes, just a lot of colours and a lot of excitement ahead of the opening game.

**Alex Ritson** (3:04)
Usually when a country hosts the World Cup, it goes football mad. You don't even call it football in America though. Are they going football mad, soccer mad?

**Shyamma Khalil** (3:18)
So, I've agreed with our producers that I'm going to say soccer, football, football, soccer and use those two words interchangeably throughout the tournament. But it's interesting that you should say this, Alex, because outside of the fan festival, outside of the zone, if you were to drive maybe half an hour out, you would be forgiven for not knowing that something is happening here, that the World Cup is being hosted by LA, by the United States. In fact, some of our BBC Sports colleagues were in a taxi and the driver said, wait a minute, the World Cup is here? Who's playing? What's going on? And you feel that some of the fans, for example, that arrived here, they were surprised that there wasn't more branding in the airport, for example, or in public transport. Whereas I remember covering the World Cup in Qatar, covering the Women's World Cup in Australia and New Zealand, and you were immersed in it. It was in your face. And I think it's a couple of things. One, LA's really sprawled out, but also the fact that the world's biggest, the world's beautiful game and the world's biggest football showcase is really competing with a lot. I will remind our listeners that basketball is the big thing here, and the Knicks in New York are hoping to make basketball history on Saturday. And that fever, that buzz has just completely taken the United States by storm.
But it is interesting that it has been a slow burn, and the organizers have been saying it has been slow to pick up. They are hoping that as the tournament goes on, and of course key to that is how far the US make it into the tournament, that that will pick up.

**Alex Ritson** (4:55)
Shyma Khalil.