What the American 2026 World Cup Might Look Like
We're at the tail-end of a whirlwind summer of soccer here in the United States. Although the Women's World Cup is reaching its apex in the coming days, you may have heard the Stars and Stripes, two-time defending champions, met their earliest exit ever in the Round of 16 on Sunday, marking the end of an international summer for the USA that saw their teams compete in the Men's U-20 World Cup, Women's World Cup, Men's Gold Cup and Men's Nations League, bringing home the trophy in the latter competition. As we Stateside soccer fans see out the rest of this World Cup, and begin to gear back up for European club season, it's important to remember just how truly blessed we are with a wealth of exciting events in the coming years.
The USSF announced in April that they will be bidding to co-host the 2027 Women's Cup with Mexico, and it's not a stretch to assume the North American bid are the favorites, in competition with Brazil, South Africa, and a joint bid from Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands. Even if we do lose out on hosting rights, however, the next three summers will feature the 2024 edition of the Copa América, followed by a tournament announced just this summer, a new-look 32-team Club World Cup in 2025.
But let's be honest- all other tournaments at any level pale in comparison to the grandaddy of them all, the Men's World Cup, and in 2026, the biggest sporting event in the World will be on our shores, as well as in 5 cities in Canada and Mexico. It will also be the biggest World Cup to date, as the 2026 edition will be the first to ever feature 48 teams, where the last seven editions of the quadrennial tournament included 32. A few years ago, right before the North American trio would go on to win hosting rights, I previewed what this tournament might look like. Now, with the 2022 World Cup in our rear-view mirror, it's time to take an updated look, with the host cities now determined and more information about the makeup of the tournament now available.
The Draw
The 4 pots will each hold 12 teams
Each pot will be seeded in order of a team's FIFA ranking, with the exception of co-hosts Canada, Mexico and the Untied States earning the top 'seeds' regardless of FIFA rank
Per FIFA, the field will consist of: 3 North American teams (in addition to the hosts), 6 South American teams, 16 European teams, 8 African teams, 9 Asian teams, and 1 team from Oceania
The remaining two spots will be filled by two 3-team playoffs, wherein the 2 seed plays the 3 seed in each bracket, and the winner advances to play the 1 seed for a spot in the tournament
For this simulation, the pots and playoff fields were filled out strictly by current FIFA ranking. There hasn't been any word-- nor do I expect there will be until much closer to the tournament --where and how the four playoff matches will be played. If I had to guess, they will not only forgo the home and away option, they will in fact do what was done for the 2022 World Cup last year and this summer's Gold Cup by having one stadium host the entire single-elimination event. That said, I think it would be a cool opportunity to have matches in each of the three hosting nations while also avoiding too much travel, so that's the way I played it out in this hypothetical scenario below.
Qualification Playoffs
The Group Stage
12 groups of 4 teams
No more than two European teams in one group, and no more than one team per all other confederations (with the possible exception of the playoff winners, whose identity likely won't be known until after the draw is completed)
The top two from each group will automatically advance to a Round of 32, as will the eight best-performing 3rd-placed teams
FIFA's original vision for the 48-team Cup was to have 16 groups of 3 teams. This was a wildly unpopular decision, as it would have meant weirdly long layoffs between matches for certain teams, as well as the end of the oft-dramatic, simultaneous kickoffs between all 4 teams on the last round of the group stage. Fortunately, though, in the wake of an incredibly eventful, and frankly wild, group stage at the 2022 World Cup, one in which just about every group experienced some level of late drama in one if not both simultaneous matches, FIFA heeded the cry of fans and pundits alike, and reversed course, officially signing off on 12 groups of 4. While this move was a rare win from the governing body for the sport and tournament alike, it did yield one problem: there are to be 16 host cities, and under their original plan, this would have set up perfectly to have one "host city" per group. This will not be possible with 12 groups, and as such, some more creativity will be needed to avoid putting some teams in situations where they might play in, say, Vancouver one day and then 3,450 miles away in Miami just a few days later.
Below is the result of my simulated draw for the group stage, and the photos following those show my best approximation at where the location of each group match might be. I did my best to go in order of what would necessitate the least amount of travel for teams between matches, but this was sometimes difficult due to two constraints: one, you want to avoid having any host stadium host a lopsided number of matches, especially in a condensed timeframe. And two, while it's possible (and even likely) the United States could play at any one of the 11 stadiums in their country, fellow co-hosts Canada and Mexico will likely play all their matches in one or two venues.
Group Stage Schedule and Location
The Knockout Stages
An unprecedented Round of 32, played in each of the 16 venues
Across the ensuing Round of 16, Quarterfinals, Semifinals, 3rd-place match and Final, each venue will then host one more match
From the Quarterfinals onwards, all matches will be in the United States
In the Round of 32, 8 group winners will play 3rd-place finishers, 4 will play 2nd-place finishers
The 8 2nd-place finishers that don't play group winners will play other 2nd-place finishers
Now, this is where my approximation of the 2026 World Cup turns into total conjecture; I have no clue what the format for the Round of 32 onwards will be, and truthfully, I assume FIFA still don't either. Had they moved forward with 16 groups, the round of 32 pretty clearly would have been one group winner vs. the adjacent group runner-up, so on and so forth, much like the current Round of 16 setup is. However, with 12 group winners, 12 group runners-up, and 8 3rd-place teams, the format isn't as straightforward.
My two cents? The easiest way to do this is chronologically, so you don't run the risk of a 2nd or 3rd-place team in Group L finishing group play on a Thursday, and then immediately needing to jet across the country (or to another country altogether) two days later. That's why you'll see below I break the eligible 3rd-placed teams down by when they finish. One caveat to that, though: this would preclude teams from the same group (i.e. if the United States won Group A, the earliest 3rd-place finisher they could play would be from Group B, even in the event that the 3rd-place team in Group A qualifies for the Round of 32). As for the group winners that play 3rd-placed teams vs. the ones that play runners-up? I think it makes sense to introduce a somewhat merit-based way to decide that: in my eyes, it would be the groups with the 3 hosts, reigning champ Argentina, and the 4 highest-ranked seeds besides them. (Obviously, this is working off the assumption that the seeded team wins their group, which doesn't happen almost as much as it does.) To counteract this advantage, the group winners who had to play 2nd-placed teams in the Round of 32 rather than 3rd-placed team, would then face off the 2nd-placed teams again in R16, whereas the fortunate eight from above would have to play other group winners. Clear as mud? Cool.
As for the location of these knockout stage games, this is where I do anticipate a logical progression. All 16 venues will be used in the Round of 32, obviously, and then between the Round of 16, quarterfinals, semifinals, 3rd-place match, and Final, each venue will host one more match. (It is worth remembering though, that though locations for each game, even including the Final, haven't been confirmed, FIFA have stated the tournament will be exclusively in the U.S. from the quarterfinal stage onwoards.) Surveying the 16 venues, I think they actually set up nicely for the tournament to progress in a rough version of "regionals":
North (Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Toronto)
South (Atlanta, Guadalajara, Mexico City, Miami)
Central (Dallas, Houston, Kansas City, Monterrey)
West (Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, Vancouver)
In the pictures below, you'll see how everything I'm talking about, both in terms of format and location, might play out. Who knows if this will be anywhere close to reality! Knowing both FIFA and the federations of the three host nations, it probably makes too sense to happen this way! But in the absence of more information, I will opt to continue believing I know how to structure this better than they do:
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