A Mexican fan after the elimination of El Tri in the World Cup in Qatar. KARIM JAAFAR (AFP)
This World Cup is not over yet and I am already anxious to remember that there are less than three and a half years left for the next one.
Yes, only 42 months, only 1,283 days to have 10 United Cup games in Mexico.
By the way, 10 of eighty games!
What a World Cup awaits us between Tuesday, June 9 and Saturday, July 18, 2026. Thanks to the notorious ambition of Gianni Infantino, who even sought to hold these tournaments every two years (and fortunately they stopped him dead), the following edition of your event will take place, for the first time in history, with 48 participating teams.
Three are already classified as host countries -United States, Mexico and Canada-, but I am going to tell you how and from where the rest of the guests will arrive for this challenge, which will last almost six weeks.
The places
Conmebol could feel mistreated since it has affiliates who are very capable of fighting for the World Cup in any edition and they gave it the same places as its neighbors to the north, Concacaf, that is, six safe places and the possibility of one more through a play-off
However, it is a very fair number, since while Concacaf has 41 affiliated countries that will compete for those seven possible places (17% of the Confederation would qualify for the World Cup), Conmebol could take 70 percent of its members, since which are only 10: Argentina, Brazil (the only ones who raffled the group stage in Qatar 2022), Uruguay, Colombia, Paraguay, Chile, Peru, Ecuador, Bolivia and Venezuela.
The ones that took a Bob Beamon-type leap are Asia and Africa;
the AFC (Asian Football Confederation) will go from 4.5 to 8.5 places (that is, eight, plus the possibility of another via playoffs);
while the CAF (African Football Confederation) will grow from five to 9.5 places, so 18.5% of its affiliates could play in the 2026 World Cup.
Europe has 55 affiliated federations and had 13 places in Qatar.
For the 2026 United World Cup, UEFA will grow three places to have 16 participants, with which 29% of its members will play the next World Cup in the United States, Mexico and Canada.
Finally, we have Oceania, the "ugly duckling" of world soccer, which had no guaranteed place and could only access these tournaments through the playoffs, which on this last occasion they lost against Concacaf (Costa Rica).
Well, Oceania will now be able to take one of its 14 affiliates to the 2026 edition, plus the possibility of another space, via repechage.
Host Cities
For Mexico, the venues will be Guadalajara, Mexico City and Monterrey.
In the United States: Atlanta, Boston, Dallas, Houston, Kansas City, Los Angeles, Miami, New York/New Jersey, Philadelphia, San Francisco and Seattle.
And in Canada, Vancouver and Toronto.
The format
After thinking about it a lot, FIFA decided that those 48 selected will be distributed into 16 groups of three teams each, from which two qualifiers will come out per sector.
The leaders of each group will play against a second from the following letter (the leader of Group A vs. the second of B and so on) in the Round of 16.
What things are: Mexico can advance to the group stage, then win the next round and not reach the dream fifth game, because in groups they will only play twice.
Anyway, the issue is that the champion team will play the same seven games that are customary in recent editions, since they will add the round of 32 or the Round of 16, but they will take away a game in the group stage.
Departure
The fact is that they have between 12 and 24 months to settle the accounts for this World Cup and another 18 to save for a World Cup full of venues, teams and planes.
Alejandro Gómez
is director of AS Mexico.
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