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World Cup 2026 - USA/Canada/Mexico
Comments
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https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/64032538
A sign of how things have moved forward with stadiums in the US, that NONE of the stadiums used in 1994 will be used in 2026.2 -
The stadiums in the US are amazing. No other country comes close.0
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It's a World Cup things, as within UEFADave2l said:It is strange how much England are ignored for world Cup hosting bids. The likes of France, Germany etc are a lot more likely to be a host nation, even though they've already done it often enough.
Perhaps we are the Millwall of the globe. No one really likes us.
We do already have a great economy in comparison to other nations, our island is over populated, its usually cold, and we gave birth to hooliganism, and our food is dreadful
But we are a multicultural nation! Just eat your fish n chips, witness a punch up, let us host a world Cup and f*ck off!
Euro 96
The biggest matches in Euro 2020 were played at Wembley
A great chance of being the main host of Euro 2028
The history of England "running" world football for a long time counts against us0 -
I can certainly see the US winning the WC within the next 20/30 years, not sure about the next onesam3110 said:My Dad is putting £50 on the US for the '26 WC, probably each way and outright, based on home advantage, and having another 4 years worth of experience in their youthful side, and the money they're throwing at football ("soccer") right now.2 -
Potentially Iran and Iraq playing in the States, that would be fantastic!Callumcafc said:Who would qualify for a 48-team World Cup?
The teams in bold are the additional 16
- Asia: Australia, Iran, Iraq, Japan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, UAE
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Confirmed as twelve 4 team groups, winners, runners-up, and 8 best 3rd placed teams to go through to the Last 32.
104 matches now compared to 64 last year (and 80 if they'd gone with the 3 team groups).
Means 8 games to win it rather than 7.
It's better than the 3 team groups, but 72 games just to get to the same amount of teams we had this time is a lot!1 -
104 games feels absolutely enormous, but I’m not going to complain about it. The more World Cup, the better.FIFA made the right decision moving it back to 4 team groups.4
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More chances to bag tickets so I’m not complaining…2
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I disagree, to be honest - the Euros were better as a 16 team tournament rather than 24 - more chance of decent teams playing each other, more riding on the games with only 2 going through per group.
The 2022 World Cup last group games were brilliant, whereas in 2026 I think they'll be a lot of teams already through and resting players etc.
I do agree on the 4 team groups over 3 though, the 3 team groups was a terrible idea.
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With 12 groups and best 8 3rd placers going through, there will be some duds.
But thinking back to groups like the France, Germany, Portugal, Hungary one for the Euros, that was great drama towards the end there.1 - Sponsored links:
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Could of had 64 teams in it, so 16 groups of 4 teams top 2 in each group goes through to a round of 32 teams, at least it would stop that 3rd place nonsense. Personally prefer the old format with 32 teams but if FIFA want to extend it then I'd rather they go the full hog and have 64 teams in it then 48.0
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That would be 128 games though, and mean some really poor standard teams qualifying.HastingsRed said:Could of had 64 teams in it, so 16 groups of 4 teams top 2 in each group goes through to a round of 32 teams, at least it would stop that 3rd place nonsense. Personally prefer the old format with 32 teams but if FIFA want to extend it then I'd rather they go the full hog and have 64 teams in it then 48.
Scotland, for example.5 -
North Lower Neil said:
That would be 128 games though, and mean some really poor standard teams qualifying.HastingsRed said:Could of had 64 teams in it, so 16 groups of 4 teams top 2 in each group goes through to a round of 32 teams, at least it would stop that 3rd place nonsense. Personally prefer the old format with 32 teams but if FIFA want to extend it then I'd rather they go the full hog and have 64 teams in it then 48.
Scotland, for example.
I think you will get that with 48 teams anyway, should have kept it to 32 teams. I think having 8 3rd place teams getting through is slightly ridiculous.0 -
San Marino maybe.North Lower Neil said:
That would be 128 games though, and mean some really poor standard teams qualifying.HastingsRed said:Could of had 64 teams in it, so 16 groups of 4 teams top 2 in each group goes through to a round of 32 teams, at least it would stop that 3rd place nonsense. Personally prefer the old format with 32 teams but if FIFA want to extend it then I'd rather they go the full hog and have 64 teams in it then 48.
Scotland, for example.
But Scotland is stretching it a bit.4 -
Doing 12 groups of four and having 24 through, 24 knocked out with an extra knockout round for the 12 runners up and 4 worst group winners (plus 8 byes into the round of 16 for the best group winners) would’ve been better than this IMO.
It would’ve encouraged teams to play their best sides in every group game rather than rotate like we saw Brazil, France etc. do in Qatar.
But I won’t grumble too much because it’s much better than 16 groups of three.0 -
Very goodCallumcafc said:Doing 12 groups of four and having 24 through, 24 knocked out with an extra knockout round for the 12 runners up and 4 worst group winners (plus 8 byes into the round of 16 for the best group winners) would’ve been better than this IMO.
It would’ve encouraged teams to play their best sides in every group game rather than rotate like we saw Brazil, France etc. do in Qatar.
But I won’t grumble too much because it’s much better than 16 groups of three.0 -
Everyone says this but the last couple of Euros have been great, admittedly last one wasn't as good as a single host but the football was good and plenty of drama, as was the last world cup. Plenty of smaller nations have done well at these last few tournaments that normally wouldn't have got there. This isn't to say more teams = better tournament but equally it doesn't mean less teams = better tournament, I just think it's a bit of a lazy comment that gets brought out every time a tournament changes. Personally as a fan I don't mind having more games to watch.North Lower Neil said:I disagree, to be honest - the Euros were better as a 16 team tournament rather than 24 - more chance of decent teams playing each other, more riding on the games with only 2 going through per group.
The 2022 World Cup last group games were brilliant, whereas in 2026 I think they'll be a lot of teams already through and resting players etc.
I do agree on the 4 team groups over 3 though, the 3 team groups was a terrible idea.2 -
Gonna cost a fortune in Panini stickers11
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Qualifiers become even more meaningless.6
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FIFA want to expand the tournament so more countries can participate and there's more global interest. It might sound daft but let's not pretend we wouldn't all enjoy a 128 team, straight knockout tournament. Turn it into an Olympics of football. Two legged qualifiers simply weed out the real minnows and then everyone else gets their shot at glory. An FA Cup like tournament for nations.
The winning team would only have to play 7 games as per now. It would also free up time in the calendar for FIFA to cut qualifiers and instead have their world club cup or whatever they want to do. No one really enjoys the slog of qualification.2 - Sponsored links:
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104 World Cup games...fuck yeah.2
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I did a 64 team World Cup in Sensible World of Soccer once, it worked fine there so I don't know what the problem is.4
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Best place 3rd place teams never seems fair to me. I still believe 16 for the Euros and 32 for the world cup were the perfect numbers.7
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Portugal won Euro 2016 after finishing 3rd in their group after 3 draws.Friend Or Defoe said:Best place 3rd place teams never seems fair to me. I still believe 16 for the Euros and 32 for the world cup were the perfect numbers.1 -
There will be too many matches. I've always watched every match - if recording some and fast forwarding through some bits counts as watching every match .
With over 100 matches, I will be giving many matches a miss completely to the extent that I will probably watch less than usual overall.
I think that FIFA are shooting The World Cup in the foot.5 -
There's also the time difference to consider as depending on the venues, they will be anywhere from 4-7 hours behind, so some games won't be starting until past midnight in England.jimmymelrose said:There will be too many matches. I've always watched every match - if recording some and fast forwarding through some bits counts as watching every match .
With over 100 matches, I will be giving many matches a miss completely to the extent that I will probably watch less than usual overall.
I think that FIFA are shooting The World Cup in the foot.0 -
It will depend on how many games per day need to be squeezed in but 2014 in Brazil had games kicking off at 5pm, 8pm and 11pm UK time so I’d expect very similar - with probably another game kicking off at 2am as well, so 11 hours of non-stop football from 5pm to 4am.Chris_from_Sidcup said:
There's also the time difference to consider as depending on the venues, they will be anywhere from 4-7 hours behind, so some games won't be starting until past midnight in England.jimmymelrose said:There will be too many matches. I've always watched every match - if recording some and fast forwarding through some bits counts as watching every match .
With over 100 matches, I will be giving many matches a miss completely to the extent that I will probably watch less than usual overall.
I think that FIFA are shooting The World Cup in the foot.0 -
New logo for the tournament revealed last night…
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Bob... "Erm... Dave we've got FIFA coming in five minutes, have you done that logo we agreed to do...?"
Dave... "Hot damn I clean forgot... I'll throw something together in MS Paint now"
Five minutes later
FIFA... "We love it... How much do we owe you..."
Bob... "That'll be $500,000 please"
FIFA... "DONE... What an absolute deal we've got"10 -
Callumcafc said:
It will depend on how many games per day need to be squeezed in but 2014 in Brazil had games kicking off at 5pm, 8pm and 11pm UK time so I’d expect very similar - with probably another game kicking off at 2am as well, so 11 hours of non-stop football from 5pm to 4am.Chris_from_Sidcup said:
There's also the time difference to consider as depending on the venues, they will be anywhere from 4-7 hours behind, so some games won't be starting until past midnight in England.jimmymelrose said:There will be too many matches. I've always watched every match - if recording some and fast forwarding through some bits counts as watching every match .
With over 100 matches, I will be giving many matches a miss completely to the extent that I will probably watch less than usual overall.
I think that FIFA are shooting The World Cup in the foot.The 1994 World Cup in the USA had kick off times that generally catered for European viewers, with the latest games starting at 4.30pm Pacific Time (12.30 in the UK).
But the problem is that now they have to fit in A LOT more matches. 1994 had 52 matches, now it's double.
I read somewhere that they were discussing possibly having up to 6 matches on some days, with games starting at 1pm Eastern Time (6pm UK time) and continuing every two hours throughout the day. If that's the case there will be some long nights ahead for European viewers as it would mean games going on until 6-7am UK time.
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