OT: 44 cities in North America seeking to host FIFA World Cup 2026

[oconnor9sean]

If it's 12, I'll guess the USA gets 8, Canada gets 2 and Mexico gets 2.

USA

(no doubters)
NYC - Metlife
LA - Rose Bowl or New Rams Stadium
Chicago - Soldier Field
Dallas - ATT Stadium

(probables)
DC - FedEx
Seattle - Century Link

(toss ups)
Atlanta - Mercedes Benz
San Francisco - Levi's

(Las Vegas, Miami, Boston & Philly are my HMs)

Canada

Toronto - BMO (Not ideal size though, might need to build a new stadium)
Vancouver - BC Place

(Montreal is the HM)

Mexico

Mexico City - Estadio Azteca
Guadalajara - Jalisco

 

[Jerkini]

Rogers Center is a terrible venue for soccer. BMO Field is barely adequate if they can get a real field out there.

 

[LeHab]

I don't know why everyone is suggesting that Montreal's Olympic Stadium should host games?

Looks like Canada would like to have four cities host game out of nine proposed.

https://www.mlssoccer.com/post/2017...wants-four-cities-host-2026-world-cup-matches

As much I would like to see the Big O tore down, Montreal plans to invest a lot in a new roof. It is the biggest venue in Canada, still a tourist attraction and let's also not forget politics of Quebec. Not having a game hosted in La Belle Province would be a tough sell.

Unless Saputo expands to +40K, I'm pretty sure there will be a game at the Big O. Getting temporary natural grass should not be a problem.

 

[um]

Rogers Center is a terrible venue for soccer. BMO Field is barely adequate if they can get a real field out there.

Why is it terrible? I've never seen a soccer game there.

 

[CorbeauNoir]

Why is it terrible? I've never seen a soccer game there.

It's a baseball stadium, that in itself makes it awful for soccer and wouldn't meet FIFA standards. Ditto for the O and BC Place for that matter, the fields on both stadiums are quite literally carpet laid out on concrete. I don't even know how the field at BC Place could be properly converted for grass, it's more appropriate to call it a convention centre that occasionally hosts sports. It's way too reliant on events using hard flooring compared to virtually any other football stadium to make a natural grass surface feasible.

Canada hosting a WC just makes no sense to me at all even in a partial capacity, it seems like something being brute-forced on account of a Canadian now being in charge of CONCACAF. Considering how much Canadians like to humblebrag about being progressive and tolerant they ought to be looking at the sorts of atrocious things FIFA are allowing to happen in Qatar on their watch and tell the whole org to pound sand.

 

[powerstuck]

It's a baseball stadium, that in itself makes it awful for soccer and wouldn't meet FIFA standards. Ditto for the O and BC Place for that matter, the fields on both stadiums are quite literally carpet laid out on concrete. I don't even know how the field at BC Place could be properly converted for grass, it's more appropriate to call it a convention centre that occasionally hosts sports. It's way too reliant on events using hard flooring compared to virtually any other football stadium to make a natural grass surface feasible.

Canada hosting a WC just makes no sense to me at all even in a partial capacity, it seems like something being brute-forced on account of a Canadian now being in charge of CONCACAF. Considering how much Canadians like to humblebrag about being progressive and tolerant they ought to be looking at the sorts of atrocious things FIFA are allowing to happen in Qatar on their watch and tell the whole org to pound sand.

They way i understand the issue is that the USA won't host the WC on its own because of the costs related (security, logistics, all stadiums up to latest standards, etc).

So the WC is either USA + Canada and/or Mexico or no WC at all.

 

[Tom ServoMST3K]

No doubt as USA have successful had one and Mexico two. USA went with a solo bid for 2022 but finished 2nd to Qatar (with all shenanigans we know). With more teams and games (80 in 2026 vs 64 in 2022) there is not that much impact by sharing it.

Having Canada riding shotgun will hopefully help raise local interest, competitiveness level and also have a positive impact on MLS. I think it also increases the chances to have it hosted in NA as the other two countries already hosted.

Canada's best chance to participate in one is as a Host Country, hopefully we can put a decent team at least. Canada already hosted U20 and Women World Cup's with success but there is no way we could host men tournament solo.

With the new format, not a chance, but with the old format, I think we could have held a great tournament. Stadiums are all like 5,000 too small for FIFA, but I think it would have been fine.

I don't think the USA had the political capitol in FIFA to go for a solo bid, so they needed to tack Canada on.

 

[rabinsurance]

Keep in mind FIFA is expanding to a 48 team tournament, so more games.

- 16 groups of 3 teams that play a round robin. 48 games
- 32 team elimination bracket, with a 3rd place game. 32 games

Bid breakdown:
- Canada: 10 games
- Mexico: 10 games
- USA: 60 games including all games from quarterfinals forward.

Guesstimate of the game breakdown based on %'s:
- Canada: 6-7 group games, 3-4 round of 16/32 games
- Mexico: 6-7 group games, 3-4 round of 16/32 games
- USA: 34-36 group games, 16-18 round of 16/32 games, 8 remaining playoff games

A guess at where the hosts could be:
Canada: Edmonton, Montreal, Vancouver, Toronto unless a larger capacity stadium is built elsewhere between now and then. 2x in Edmonton and Montreal, 3x in Toronto and Vancouver.

Mexico: Mexico City is of course a lock. Monterrey highly likely as well. I suspect they'd like to spread at least a few more of the games around outside Mexico City since this is such a big occasion. Likely places: Guadalajara, Puebla City.

USA:
Locks (6): Los Angeles (Rose Bowl or new NFL stadium), Bay Area (Levi's), Dallas (AT&T), Boston (Gillette), Washington DC (FedEx), New York (MetLife).

Highly Likely (4-5): Chicago (Soldier), Atlanta (Mercedes-Benz), at least one Florida location of Orlando/Miami/Tampa--maybe two locations with fewer games each, Seattle (CenturyLink).

Good Odds (3): Detroit (likely Michigan Stadium over Ford field), Phoenix (UoP), Carolina (BofA).

Interesting Possibilities (8): Kansas City (Arrowhead), Columbus (OSU), Houston (NRG), Las Vegas (new stadium), Minneapolis (USBank), Nashville (Nissan), New Orleans (Superdome), Denver (SA). Only reason I listed Denver lower here is if they'd have any altitude concerns, but then there will be games in Mexico City at high elevation as well.

With 60 games to go around in the USA, I wouldn't be surprised if they selected 15-20 US stadiums. Although some of those might have only a single game.

Columbus is not on the list of sites submitted, neither is Michigan Stadium in Ann Arbor.
http://www.espnfc.com/fifa-world-cu...sider-49-stadiums-across-us-mexico-and-canada

 

[djpatm]

Calgary being on the list makes me think there is something in the works for a football stadium besides the failure that was CalgaryNext.

Otherwise why on earth would they be entered for consideration over some cities with better facilities. McMahon is a total hole that even the African teams would call subpar.

 

[mouser]

They way i understand the issue is that the USA won't host the WC on its own because of the costs related (security, logistics, all stadiums up to latest standards, etc).

So the WC is either USA + Canada and/or Mexico or no WC at all.

I assume you're joking here.

North America is huge favorites to host in 2026. Europe and Asia can't bid as they have the 2018 and 2022 events. So that leaves North America, South America and Africa. The only competing bid at this time I'm aware of is from Morocco. There were a few South American nations that expressed interest, but I don't believe any of them ended up making an official bid, and seem to be looking towards 2030 now.

The US was prepared to make their own solo bid, with their biggest competition probably coming from a Mexico bid. By bringing Mexico into the bid with the US that pretty much makes it a slam dunk the World Cup is coming to North America. I don't know all the politics behind including Canada in the bid, but they're already partners in MLS, so it seems positive overall for the league to have them host some games.

 

[djpatm]

Canada was going to bid for 2026 as well and were thought to have a great shot after hosting every level of the event before besides the Mens WC.

They probably figured the three way bid would be a slam dunk way to ensure that all three countries got some games.

 

[mouser]

Columbus is not on the list of sites submitted, neither is Michigan Stadium in Ann Arbor.
http://www.espnfc.com/fifa-world-cu...sider-49-stadiums-across-us-mexico-and-canada

The articles I've read seem to say those are the 44 cities/49 stadiums the joint bid committee is reaching out to asking if they're interested in hosting games. I haven't seen a statement that the bid committee wouldn't consider applications from any potential hosts not on that list?

Michigan Stadium has hosted a couple huge International Champions Cup games with 100k+ attendance. OSU seems like an intriguing option with its stadium size, state population, and presence of a local MLS team.

 

[mouser]

Canada was going to bid for 2026 as well and were thought to have a great shot after hosting every level of the event before besides the Mens WC.

They probably figured the three way bid would be a slam dunk way to ensure that all three countries got some games.

I haven't read up on the potential Canada solo bid. Did they say how they planned to address stadium capacity? Especially for the final.

I don't think the final has been played in a stadium with less then 70k capacity since 1962 in Chile.

 

[LeHab]

I haven't read up on the potential Canada solo bid. Did they say how they planned to address stadium capacity? Especially for the final.

I don't think the final has been played in a stadium with less then 70k capacity since 1962 in Chile.

Heaven't heard of a solo bid either. FIFA requires to have 80K seats for opener and final. I think the only way Canada could get one of these is if Toronto gets an NFL franchise.

 

[KevFu]

**** the entire concept of a daytime summer game outside in Las Vegas, though.

The concept of a continental World Cup still bugs the hell out of me, there's enough stadiums ready to host 2 simultaneous World Cups in the US as it is. 60 of the 80 games would be held within the US, though.

1. Who says they'd have to play during the day in Las Vegas? There's night games in the World Cup. "But they'd have to start at 9 p.m. in the summer!" So what? Vegas is a 24/7 city, and the games are on at crazy times in 3/4 of the world.


2. One knock on a US bid is always "the country's so spread out!" But I don't get why that's such a big deal.

You can put the Groups into regional clusters of stadiums, and have the winners of the groups move inward towards Dallas.

Would be cool if they would stick at least primarily to soccer-specific stadiums, otherwise this will end up being like watching Islanders hockey. But I like the idea of hosting it in all three countries definitely.

I don't understand that comparison... Soccer Specific Stadiums are smaller venues built for soccer, but seating only 16,000 to 25,000 people. The 1994 World Cup was in football stadiums that held 55,000 to 100,000 people which met FIFA field regulation size.

Heaven't heard of a solo bid either. FIFA requires to have 80K seats for opener and final. I think the only way Canada could get one of these is if Toronto gets an NFL franchise.

I mean zero disrespect to Canada (my love for which was already high and grows daily with every face palm moment delivered by the POTUS)

But I can't see Canada getting a solo World Cup bid because you have the same "problem" the US has of all our cities being spread out across four time zones, without the benefit of having massive venues already built/available.

It's crazy stupid that the USA hasn't gotten a second hosting bid, with the obvious FIFA corruption the only explanation. Brazil spent $14 billion on hosting. Our bid had a budget under $700 million because we had 58 stadiums interested and able to host. (The vast majority of the US bid expenses were for the opulent demands of FIFA executives).

USA 1994 has the record for highest total attendance: 3,570,000. And the five World Cups since have had 12 MORE GAMES. 1994 average attendance is still over 15,000 higher than second place. And that's before new NFL stadiums in a ton of markets.

 

[Albatros]

I don't understand that comparison... Soccer Specific Stadiums are smaller venues built for soccer, but seating only 16,000 to 25,000 people. The 1994 World Cup was in football stadiums that held 55,000 to 100,000 people which met FIFA field regulation size.

In the NHL everyone expects premium ice quality that will allow the stars to shine playing hockey in optimal conditions. And yet there are arenas that do not even have proper ice-making equipment resulting in poor ice quality that hurts the product as a whole. In soccer if the pitch is not good the results are the same. Creating and maintaining a world class natural grass pitch takes time and skill, instead I feel like the plan is just to install some sod rolls after the NFL season is over and hope that all goes well. Maybe the NFL teams would agree to adopt a hybrid solution like the Desso GrassMaster that is already used in Green Bay and Philadelphia, that way the condition should be clear already much before the tournament.

 

[RossiyaSport]

Expanding to so many teams will make the World Cup qualifying almost pointless because every half way decent team will make it. Compare to the qualifying going on right now for 2018. Its going to go down to the wire and several sports are up for grabs. A few big teams could miss out.

I have also seen speculation that Canada might drop out of this if they get the 2026 Winter Olympics. With the thought process of why should they spend millions of dollars and will probably just get a handful of games most people wouldn't care about like Bulgaria vs. Peru.

 

[TOGuy14]

Toronto is a good location but has one dilemma:

Our biggest stadium, Skydome / Rogers Center, is built for baseball and quite old (coming up on 30 years). FIFA doesn't like old infrastrucutre.

We have a very nice soccer stadium in BMO field, but it has a maximum capacity of 40,000ish with all possible additional space deployed, which is the floor that FIFA accepts for WC matches I believe.

 

[Jeffrey]

I don't think Montreal can do it. No way on Olympic stadium unless they move some portable grass in right before the game and the outdoor stadiums are too small.

I think this is what they would do...

 

[GindyDraws]

Indianapolis would be suited to hosting one or two of the games, due to hotels, experience, and proximity to stadium.

 

[djpatm]

Heaven't heard of a solo bid either. FIFA requires to have 80K seats for opener and final. I think the only way Canada could get one of these is if Toronto gets an NFL franchise.

Hard to find links now cause all you get is results for the joint bids but the CSA apparently had a plan for the final stadium:

http://www.canadasoccer.com/files/CanadaSoccer_StrategicPlan2014_2018_EN.pdf


I'm guessing some molestation of Rogers Center or a brand new stadium.

 

[Goldenshark]

(First - definitely not a local to call it that. Nor is it called "Frisco")

Ahem.

Santa Clara. (Home of the NFL San Francisco 49ers. Where the Sharks played their Stadium Series game)

A lot closer to San Jose (8 miles to city hall) than San Francisco (43).

As a former SF and Bay native I love saying Frisco and San Fran just to bug the snoots.

BTW, do you remember the '94 World Cup? They referred to the games played at the old Stanford Stadium as San Francisco when they announced the dates and tickets, so the previous poster was fine, that's how the officials would announce and refer to it if Levi's got awarded a game.

 

[LeHab]

I mean zero disrespect to Canada (my love for which was already high and grows daily with every face palm moment delivered by the POTUS)

But I can't see Canada getting a solo World Cup bid because you have the same "problem" the US has of all our cities being spread out across four time zones, without the benefit of having massive venues already built/available.

It's crazy stupid that the USA hasn't gotten a second hosting bid, with the obvious FIFA corruption the only explanation. Brazil spent $14 billion on hosting. Our bid had a budget under $700 million because we had 58 stadiums interested and able to host. (The vast majority of the US bid expenses were for the opulent demands of FIFA executives).

I would be very very surprised to see a serious solo bid coming from Canada. There is not much we bring to the table that US can't provide for this one as well. Maybe our brand as a humanitarian country which apparently is a factor. Canada is very fortunate to be considered for 10 games.

 

[aqib]

Toronto is a good location but has one dilemma:

Our biggest stadium, Skydome / Rogers Center, is built for baseball and quite old (coming up on 30 years). FIFA doesn't like old infrastrucutre.

We have a very nice soccer stadium in BMO field, but it has a maximum capacity of 40,000ish with all possible additional space deployed, which is the floor that FIFA accepts for WC matches I believe.

It was built to be dual purpose. Its hosted football and soccer in the past (Man U vs Celtic and Liverpool vs TFC). The only problem is that Rogers has been planning to retrofit the stadium to a pure baseball stadium (sort of like what Anaheim did with their stadium).

 

[Jeffrey93]

Canada
Toronto (Rogers Center)
Vancouver (BC Place)
Montreal (Olympic Stadium)

It'd either be 4 cities or someone would have to be removed from that list to have Edmonton put on it.

I couldn't imagine an open-air stadium with a capacity of 60,000 plus would be left out. The rest are domes....and let's be honest.....Montreal's Stade Olympique is a tad dated and is currently housing refugee claimants from the USA.

It's still an iconic building....and I'd prefer it be included.....but not at the expense of Edmonton.