Facebook, Twitter Vie for Real-Time World Cup Conversation

In this Oct. 15 2013, file photo, Portugal's Nani celebrates after scoring his side's second goal against Luxembourg during their 2014 World Cup qualifying group F soccer match, at the Municipal stadium in Coimbra, Portugal.

With the World Cup just days away from kicking off, Facebook and Twitter are both taking steps to serve as the platform for conversation and news about the games. Facebook launched a new Trending World Cup page on Tuesday that aims to serve as a central hub to "experience the action in real-time." The page will include scores and highlights from the various games as well as updates from friends, players and teams. 

See also: The Complete Guide to World Cup Team Nicknames 

At the same time, Twitter introduced a Match timeline and World Cup timeline to make it easier for users to keep up with tweets related to the games and updates from the matches. Twitter is also bringing back hashflags, a feature first introduced in 2010.  

Facebook has been working to compete with Twitter on the real-time front for years. Facebook has scale in its favor — there are some 500 million soccer fans on the social network — but Twitter, of course, was built on real-time conversation.

Let the social media games begin.