A five-hundred-hertz sensor. Five hundred readings per second. Embedded in one of the four panels.

That sensor is how the referee will know, in real time, if the ball crossed the line. Or if a striker's toe was offside by a centimetre.

Here's the twist. A chip on one side makes the ball lopsided. Adidas had to add counter-weights across the other three panels. Balance, by accounting.

Four panels. The fewest ever. The same architecture that broke goalkeepers in twenty ten with the Jabulani.

But this time, every panel is covered in deep ridges and embossed crests. Engineered drag, at the exact speeds where the ball used to knuckle.

First kick. June eleventh. Estadio Azteca. Two thousand two hundred metres above sea level. The thinnest air of the tournament.