I will look forward to seeing him at the WC then as I doubt I will have access to the Greek 3rd division.
United States, Mexico and Canada to host 2026 World Cup
- Thread starter prath92
- Start date
Can we just move this one up for 2022, ignore Qatar and Morocco can have 2026. Win-win for everyone
Ridiculous distribution of WC places that punished European teams for being better than most.
Watch all AFC teams fail to make the 2nd round in the next few weeks and you'd see what I mean. 8 is frankly ludicrous.
Do all three countries have consistent policy regarding visas? They all use different currencies too.
What is the reasoning for all 3 being involved? Longer flight times, for what purpose?
Just seems unnecessary for no real gain.
Russia is massive and that will prove a problem for some, I'm sure but restricted it to one area of a country does not make sense and they shouldn't be penalised for it. Having a North America bid is accepting it spanned across a massive land mass where there's no need to.
Ridiculous distribution of WC places that punished European teams for being better than most.
Watch all AFC teams fail to make the 2nd round in the next few weeks and you'd see what I mean. 8 is frankly ludicrous.
?
Europe is getting 16 teams how is that being punished?
South America getting 6 with Africa and Asia getting 8 and 9 is more ridiculous IMO
Great, hosted by half the World.
What a ridiculous idea, it would be like Russia hosting games in Siberia.
What a ridiculous idea, it would be like Russia hosting games in Siberia.
The feck, you're younger than me and have already achieved the pinnacle of internet existence (moderator), why would you kick the bucket until then !?
Agreed. If there's to be 48 teams South America should just be qualified as a whole automatically. Same with all past winners/finalists/semifinalists. If we're going to stock up might as well make sure we never miss such countries as Italy and the Netherlands again.
Well I'm down for it. Live in Chicago now, so fine by me.
True. Canada and Mexico being in the bid also ensures that the backlash from Trump's offending half the world in any given tweet is lessened.
Having said that, Mexican football authorities are delighted. 10 WC games is nothing to scoff at and they might not win a lone bid outright again so this is pretty good for them. Same for Canada.
I don't understand why so many people here are so pissed. Morocco's bid barely passed the technical evaluation. This is not like Qatar winning for 2022. As for the distances, it's called aeroplanes and there's a lot of them in North America.
The 17th best team in Europe will be A LOT better than many of the AFC and CAF countries who make it there.
Well, not for the fans at any rate. FIFA and their "partners" will no doubt make out like bandits.
That's probably true but I think SA with 6 is more unfair.
It probably should be something like
UEFA 18
SA 9
Africa 7
Asia 5
NA 6
Oceania 1
Good news.
The trio USA-Mexico-Canada more powerful than the Almighty Morocco? What a surprise!
The vote by the country of football
worth all the votes in the World.
I agree that we should rename the World Cup and rebrand it as 'European Championship'
The vote by the country of football
I agree that we should rename the World Cup and rebrand it as 'European Championship'
Disappointed Vancouver, Chicago and Detroit didn't offer themselves up as host cities. But then again - it doesnt seem like you host world cup games to make a ton of money as a city.
No aeroplanes here but there are airplanes.
A couple thoughts: adding Canada to the bid didn't make much difference in terms of travel distances since most Canadian cities are close to the US border (yeah, we huddle there for warmth, as the joke goes). That said, I'm hugely disappointed Vancouver won't be hosting. Seattle is great, and CenturyLink a wonderful stadium, but crossing that border in the age of Trump is no picnic (let's hope he'll be long gone and that they'll have reformed CBP and ICE). And the nearest Canadian host, Edmonton, is a twelve-hour drive away.
Very well organized and it holds the record for highest attended WC in history
This. @RobinLFC can also add Portland, Seattle, Toronto, Orlando, New York and Minneapolis to the list. Don't assume we don't love and don't celebrate football in this part of the world
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Conmebol has 10 countries, and Bolivia, Venezuela, Ecuador and Peru aren't generally very good, you can argue they maybe deserve 7 on merit, but 9?1? May as well give everyone automatic qualification.
It's just ludicrous to give CAF 9 places and particularly AFC 8. Based on the qualification for 2018, Uzbekistan, UAB, Syria would all be there. Give it a couple of weeks and you'd see how far behind the rest of the world the AFC teams who did qualify are.I agree that we should rename the World Cup and rebrand it as 'European Championship'
As far as I'm concerned, I want:
1) to see the best teams: ticked box
2) to watch exotic teams and discover new football players: ticked box
I agree that a certain balance needs to be had regarding (2), but the way it's split now, AFC teams already mostly finish rock bottom and only occasionally make the 2nd round. If you give them more places, it'll just result in many more dead rubber games.
Hell man, you never know what might happen. Believe me, I won’t be trying to miss this!!!
Happy about this. Will probably be my first world cup as I don't think I'll have any intention of going to Qatar.
We are trying to get the best teams with some diversity yes?
-Ecuador and Bolivia are FIFA 59 and 60. Japan is 61 as Asia's fourth highest team.
Maybe:
UEFA 17
Africa 9
SA 9
Asia 5
CONCACAF 5
Oceania 1
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I would have prefered the World Cup to be held in an European country and I don't think USA would had win without Canada and Mexico help.
That being said it's convenient for the 3 parties but if I was Mexico or Canada federation I think 10 group stages games is a joke and they should had pushed to at least have some knock out stage games or something more relevant. Aside from that Mexico is going to be like a local even in USA ground so it works very well for them.
I don't get why people are complaining. The infrastructure will be top notch, Mexico has a football culture, while US are the best at organising these things (US 1994 is the best organized WC ever). And all three of them qualifying isn't a problem considering that US and Mexico would have been (most likely) qualified anyway, so it is only Canada who gets an undeserved spot.
It will easily be the best WC since Germany 2006 if not longer.
It will easily be the best WC since Germany 2006 if not longer.
But it is not so soon. There are 32 years since the last World Cup hosted in North/Central America (it is the same zone for UEFA). Since then, Europe hosted 3, Asia 2, Africa 1 and South America 1.
People are complaining for the sake of complaining.
Considering that list contains countries in 5 different continents, I'd say that is the case for every country participating regularly.
That adds up to 46. Are you counting the three host countries as part of the CONCACAF allocation?
I think we need intercontinental playoffs. Bosnia's chances of qualification don't go up much at all if we have these fixed allocations, while the USA's (even when they don't host) go up to basically 100% (which matters to me because I couldn't stomach Anel Sabanadzovic playing for the USA, where he was born but has no other ties whatsoever).
Also, I'd merge Asia and Oceania completely.
Having 9 out 10 Conmebol team makes no sense.
Uefa 17+0.5x8
Conmebol 6+0.5x2
CAF 6+0.5x2
AFC 5+0.5x2
Concacaf 5+0.5x2
New Zealand 1
Something like that seems more fair, by the way, all the half places should playoff against the 3rd tier Uefa sides.
If you are giving UEFA 17 you have to give CONMEBOL 7
I would accept no less as a negotiator (obviously neither SA or Euro had good negotiators like us)
I repeat, Bolivia, Venezuela, Ecuador and Peru aren't really very good most the time, even Paraguay aren't really better than the 3rd tier Uefa sides, why do they need 7?
Oops no, I just wasn't thinking right
Agreed, it's the easiest and most logical way to have a resemblance of a merit-based system if the lesser teams from each confederation playoff for WC places.
And yet they are ranked right around the 5th Asian and 9th African teams so your argument holds no merit. I realize you want it to be mostly European teams. But too many European teams and the World Cup loses appeal around the world. Also international football is very odd. It can change quickly.
No reason some the 20-something ranked Euro side like current Northern Ireland or Bulgaria deserves to be in the cup more than Peru or Venezuela or even China in 10 years. 16-18 is definitely enough slots for Europe moving forward. Ideally Asia and Africa will start producing more world class footballers in the next 15-20 years.
Well, under my proposal, if they're good enough, Conmebol will actually get 8 places.
Everyone rejects this playoff against Uefa idea because most people expect Uefa to sweep up most of those playoff places.
Ideally, they earn their extra places by not dropping like flies in the group stage. How many non-European/S American side do you expect in the last 8 in a few weeks? You'd be lucky to see ONE!
But the world revolves around England of course.
The salt and entitlement from English and Europeans is wild.
FIFA cares the most about money not meritocracy so from their perspective they want to maximize viewers.
From another perspective, there is something to be said for opening it up slightly more to the world to hopefully let the sport grow in countries with big populations that don't have the history yet. There's really no reason China couldn't be a good side by 2026-2030 as they have been working on infrastructure for individual Olympic sports and there isn't really competition for team sports like there is in Canada, US or India. Xi seems to love the sport as well.
I think Europe doesn't need many more spots than it already has, maybe one or two. In the 90s\early 00s before most EE teams hit a significant decline then it would have been good, but how many 2nd and 3rd tier UEFA countries have had memorable tournaments since?
The turks in 2002. Ukraine got to the quarters in 06 but were mostly awful and quite a bit worse than their late 90s\early 00s teams that lost playoffs. Portugal 06 but they were really closer to being among the best then tbh . Belgium 14, though they were mostly poor to watch. Maybe you could argue the Netherlands of 2014 had regressed far enough to be considered 2nd tier doing well.
I'm sure i've forgotten one or two, but there isn't many more. 2nd tier and 3rd tier euro teams are usually just as erratic\flawed as the better African and Asian teams. You rarely see any overperform.
The turks in 2002. Ukraine got to the quarters in 06 but were mostly awful and quite a bit worse than their late 90s\early 00s teams that lost playoffs. Portugal 06 but they were really closer to being among the best then tbh . Belgium 14, though they were mostly poor to watch. Maybe you could argue the Netherlands of 2014 had regressed far enough to be considered 2nd tier doing well.
I'm sure i've forgotten one or two, but there isn't many more. 2nd tier and 3rd tier euro teams are usually just as erratic\flawed as the better African and Asian teams. You rarely see any overperform.
That's all very well, but there needs to be some semblance of meritocracy, otherwise you may just as well invite the 48 nations with the highest GDP? Actually, even if you did that, UEFA would have 19 teams there.
You have yourself named plenty of examples of 2nd-3rd tier Europeans teams doing well. Let's not forget Africa has NEVER had a team in the SF, and Asia only had one in the last half century due to the farce in Korea.
It should always be hosted by 'one' country and thats it, don't mind two but now three? ridiculous.