I was just watching the Olympics and I realized that the announcer at the Sochi slopestyle course was speaking in English. Remember, this is a worldwide sporting event taking place in Russia. All the athletes NBC interviewed spoke English no matter what country they came from. Why is English the worldwide universal language and when did it become so widely spoken?
This has been asked before. See here.
Mostly, it happened because the United States emerged as the most powerful state in the world by a significant margin. In doing so, the U.S. replaced another English-Speaking country in the United Kingdom (though French was still the language of diplomacy & the aristocracy at this time). American/British/Australian/Canadian cultural exports & the Internet pretty contributed to widespread knowledge of English
The past two global hegemonies have been English speaking. I speak English because my country was an English colony. Many people learn English because the predominant economy is from an English speaking country. Additionally, let's say I am Chinese and I want to do business in Algeria. I don't speak French or Arabic, and my counterpart speaks no Chinese. English is probably our best bet for communication.