This summer, the BBC will be screening the World Cup in virtual reality. The broadcasts sound like a must-see for fans of emerging technology, in contexts that don’t make sense.

Have you wondered what it would be like to be right there on the pitch, in the middle of the action, as Suarez bears down on you with his incisors out, or Cristiano Ronaldo launches a gob in your direction? No, because being that close to a professional match would be a terrible way to watch one. You would be alternately remote from the action or overwhelmed by it, like being teleported into an orgy.

Which is why that’s not what they’re offering. The snappily named BBC Sport VR – Fifa World Cup Russia 2018 will take you not on to the pitch, but rather inside a luxury private box at a Russian stadium. I’m not sure that is any better. Is there a viewing advantage to watching a match through a pretend window, using a headset that makes you look like a copper-bottomed divot? Besides, being put in an oligarch’s box sounds like gangland slang for being murdered.

VR’s potential is huge, but we are running with it before we can walk. Or render a human face. Or a realistic dog. Every time I immerse myself in its parallel dimension, I come away underwhelmed by serviceable graphics, sluggish movement and sterile environments, always curiously empty, like waking up with a brain injury following a mass extinction event.

VR makes everything resemble a computer game, except less eventful. And everyone else is far more excited about it than I am. Sounds quite a lot like the actual World Cup, come to think of it. Maybe it’s the perfect medium for viewing after all?