The World Cup is the planet’s most popular sporting event, a quadrennial celebration of soccer, futbol, futebol, fotboll, voetbal, calcio, sakka, chuggu, sepak bola or your language of choice to describe the beautiful game.
Crazy to think, then, that it’s coming to the United States, Mexico and Canada … in one month? Can that be right?
Rapt anticipation, sadly, is not a phrase most would use to describe its impending arrival.
It is the biggest World Cup in history, but bigger might not necessarily be better, judging by the furor over ticket prices, match assignments, visas, hotels, transportation and pretty much everything else associated with FIFA’s grand extravaganza. And by the lack of palpable buzz despite fond memories of ’94.
There was a certain innocence and novelty to the World Cup’s first foray in an unconquered land, a coming-of-age moment for the nation and its newfound respect for jogo bonito. Three decades later, there is a certain skepticism and cynicism for FIFA’s greedy underbelly.
Maybe all that will change once the first ball is kicked and first VAR decision is debated. Maybe the game wins over everyone again in the end, anesthesia and amnesia for the pain of a $1,100 nosebleed seat, a $1,000 hotel room and $300 parking.
Ready to not, the World Cup is nearly upon us. Here’s a look at the behemoth that looms on the horizon.
Wait, there are 48 teams?
When the World Cup was last here, in 1994, the tournament had 24 teams and a mere six first-round groups. It went to 32 in 1998 and remained that way for seven tournaments, divided neatly into eight groups of four teams where only the top two in each advanced to the knockout stage.
Until FIFA president Gianni Infantino got greedy and shoved through a plan to expand to 48. (There are rumblings he wants to go to 64 next.)
That means 12 first-round groups (there’s a Group L) and 72 first-round matches, 20 more than in the entire 1994 tournament. And after 17 days and 72 matches, the field will be pared from 48 … to 32, essentially eliminating the 16 teams that didn’t deserve to be here in the first place.
The knockout stage begins at the round of 32 instead of the round of 16, adding an eighth match for teams that reach the final. It also means a glut of low-quality contests in the tournament’s opening 2½ weeks, with such captivating encounters as Scotland vs. Haiti, Curacao vs. Ivory Coast, Cape Verde vs. Saudi Arabia, Jordan vs. Algeria and Democratic Republic of Congo vs. Uzbekistan.
It largely eliminates the drama of the proverbial “Grupo de Muerte,” with eight third-place teams advancing from already diluted groups. And when minnows face whales — Haiti vs. Brazil, Curacao vs. Germany, Iraq vs. France — the result is likely a 90-minute snoozefest of bunkering defense.
The real action begins July 4 with the round of 16, or 24 days and 88 matches into the 104-match event. From there, it’s a sprint to the July 19 final at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, N.J.
Where is it?
FIFA selected 16 venues across the three host nations: 11 in the United States, three in Mexico and two in Canada. AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas, has the most matches with nine. SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California, got eight, although only one after the round of 32 (a July 10 quarterfinal).
There are four West Coast venues — SoFi, Santa Clara, Seattle and Vancouver — but most of the best teams are based on the East Coast or Mexico. Santa Clara’s Levi Stadium got particularly slighted, with nobody in the top 18 of the FIFA world rankings for any of its five group stage dates.
The West Coast did, however, get the U.S. men, who will stay in the Pacific time zone through the quarterfinals if they finish first in Group D. Their first six matches would be at SoFi, Seattle, SoFi, Santa Clara, Seattle and Sofi before moving to Texas for the semis, assuming, of course, an inconsistent lot (that’s a polite way of saying they’re not very good) get that far.
Their route: Paraguay (June 12), Australia (June 19) and Turkey (June 25) in the first round and, if they finish atop the group, a third-place team in the round of 32, potentially Belgium in the round of 16 and Spain in the quarterfinals.
Mexico gets a friendly geographic (and elevation) path as well by winning Group A with South Africa, South Korea and Czechia, staying in Mexico City at 7,200 feet for the rounds of 32 and 16 before moving to Miami for the quarters.
When do training camps open?
The short answer is they’re gonna be short.
In some past World Cups, national teams have gathered a full month before the tournament to hone tactics while building fitness. Not this year. The world’s top pro leagues, already facing fixture congestion, refused to compress their seasons to allow more rest before a World Cup that, by the way, requires most teams to play an extra match in the expanded format.
The UEFA Champions League final is May 30 in Budapest, Hungary, between England’s Arsenal and France’s Paris Saint-Germain, clubs loaded with World Cup protagonists. The tournament begins a mere 12 days later on the other side of the Atlantic.
Leagues in England, Spain and Italy run through May 24. Major League Soccer is playing that weekend as well before it takes a 7½-week break.
Top clubs will have played 50-plus matches since August, meaning you’re going to see already tired legs in summer heat and humidity — not a good combination for high quality or injury-free soccer.
Hello, hamstring pulls.
Mexico offered a unique solution. The federation arranged with Liga MX to release a dozen domestic players to the national team on May 6, guaranteeing them a spot on the World Cup roster but forcing them to skip the league playoffs or, in the case of Toluca and Tigres, the May 30 Concacaf Champions Cup final.
Toluca requested that two stars report May 7 so they could play in the CCC semis the night before. National coach Javier Aguirre put his foot down: Don’t show up May 6, don’t play in the World Cup. Alexis Vega and Jesus Gallardo missed the semi (and Toluca advanced anyway).
“It’s something we can’t be flexible about, not in the slightest,” Aguirre said.
Are tickets available?
Plenty still are.
The bad news, in many cases, is they’ll cost you a second mortgage on your house, your first born and maybe a few appendages.
FIFA keeps releasing “last-minute sales” that include thousands of available seats for the June 12 U.S. opener against Paraguay at SoFi Stadium … for $1,120 in corner sections in the upper deck. The current get-in price for the June 19 match against Australia at Seattle’s Lumen Field, a weekday noon kickoff, is $906.
The average ticket price in 1994 was a mere $58, or the equivalent of $129 in today’s dollars. Many seats were as cheap as $25. You could see most U.S. matches for well under $100.
For 2026, FIFA has adopted dynamic pricing models with ticket releases in various stages, a crass attempt to artificially pump up demand by limiting supply and hoping that FOMO compels diehard fans to splurge for four-figure nosebleed seats.
Even President Donald Trump, an unapologetic Infantino apologist, admitted: “I wouldn’t pay it either, to be honest with you.”
It has created a giant game of chicken between FIFA and fans as the first kickoffs approach, waiting to see whether the bottom drops out of the market if or when it is flooded with cheap tickets (and prices are already starting to fall).
Who’s coming?
Good question. Certainly not as many as expected.
The American Hotel and Lodging Association issued a report last week that found “anticipated demand has not translated into strong hotel bookings,” with 80% of properties saying they “are tracking below initial forecasts.” It also doesn’t help that earlier this spring FIFA dumped up to 70% of its room blocks in some cities.
Ticket prices are one culprit. The hotels aren’t helping themselves with exorbitant rates, some asking as much as $1,000 per night for a room that normally is $200. Then there are the high air fares driven by elevated oil prices, and issues getting U.S. travel visas from some countries, and geopolitical concerns, and don’t forget the local price gouging.
An 18-mile train from Manhattan to New Jersey’s MetLife Stadium that normally costs $12.60 round trip was slated to be $150 during the World Cup. After public outcry, the transit authority lowered it to $105.
That’s a bargain compared to driving and parking. A FIFA-sanctioned lot at SoFi for the U.S.-Paraguay match that requires a 1.1-mile walk to the stadium is $300.
Is anybody actually going to pay that?
We’ll find out in a month.