FIFA World Cup 2026 :Canada/Mexico/United States: Discussion Thread

[AmoreJaz]

This idealogy of when borders are opened people's minds first races to the influx of criminals is one that should be put to consideration because in the actual sense to start with, no place is void of criminality and you cannot be too careful, moreover the fear of the influx of criminals should not overshadowed the migrational benefits that could come to the country in actual sense because that is actually the situation but many will want to push it away because  they believe they should be safe first meanwhile too much safety could be danger.

There are so many reasons why there are strict rules per country when it comes to their boundaries. As the regulations per country vary, they need to implement what they have on their jurisdiction. Without the regulations, it would be chaos. And so the implementation of their governing rules and regulations are on a country basis.

Let me share my perspective about this matter, where football is considered as best sport and gives the opportunity to make money for a player then where more people will be interested in doing it. You said why India and China can't able to find 11 good players is because in India cricket is where money rains so every youngster from their childhood dream of becoming a cricketer than a football or javelin throw player but ofcourse India is also now focusing on improving their football participation by replicating something called ISL after the success of IPL (for cricket).

That is true, it depends on the country what particular sports they are in. Because the training starts from childhood and how they are oriented to be fanatic of such sports starts at a very young age. Each country has specific favorite sports and so its people tend to lean on those particular sports and acquaint their kids to those sports more often. Thus, the interest at a young age.

[giorgione]

Of course demographics have an impact because it reduces the amount of youngster that may eventually choose to pursuit a football career but that can't be a reason (or excuse) to open the border to more immigrants. Otherwise how come small countries with very little immigration like Croatia and Uruguay are so good and they only have a few million citizens?

Let me share my perspective about this matter, where football is considered as best sport and gives the opportunity to make money for a player then where more people will be interested in doing it. You said why India and China can't able to find 11 good players is because in India cricket is where money rains so every youngster from their childhood dream of becoming a cricketer than a football or javelin throw player but ofcourse India is also now focusing on improving their football participation by replicating something called ISL after the success of IPL (for cricket).

It is true that people are more attracted to money in the present times. Where more money is spent, people will gather. But not everything can be solved with money. To produce good players, systematic development is needed, as even small countries like Uruguay and Croatia have been able to do. If good quality coaching and training along with all the facilities are provided in any sport, then good players will definitely be produced.

These are countries where sport always comes first and is defined as being of primary importance and they do well, the fact that there are many sports centers like this ensures that the kids grow up as sportspeople and are able to make sport an art and a job, that's why there are so many kids who leave those countries.

[BIT-BENDER]

...
I think FIFA is intentionally doing it with 48 teams instead of 32 in order to promote football even more,even in countries which had never a possibility to be in such a huge event like the World Cup and I agree with this policy they are taking for this upcoming World Cup.
...

If countries that are less interested in football get a chance to participate in this tournament, interest in football will increase in those countries. I think this is a very correct point of view. I support this approach. In addition, the world cup organization held in Qatar showed us the success of the Asian and African teams. I look forward to seeing more teams from these continents. If the name of this organization is the World Cup, we should make it a real world game. If that happens, we will enjoy this tournament more.

There are countries that are actually interested in football but their development and facilities hinders them from participating or competing in major tournament like the world cup but the increase in the number of team will give chances to more countries that may never be able to qualify before.

[imamusma]

Next qualifier matches aren't far away from us anymore. Only a week left for them to be underway...

As for CONMEBOL... All top 5 teams in the standings have already kind of guaranteed their qualification for the WC. Colombia are still under a little threat mathematically.

Interestingly their remaining matches are also against Venezuela and Bolivia.    Only one point is enough for Colombia to secure their direct qualification too. I think they'll do it easily.

Colombia will most likely succeed in securing a direct ticket to the next 2026 World Cup, on paper, they are more favored than Bolivia and Venezuela. If Uruguay and Paraguay drop points, Colombia even has a chance to finish in a better position. Meanwhile, Brazil will most likely finish as the runnerup in the standings, their performance has improved after being taken over by Ancelotti.

[Lidger]

Of course demographics have an impact because it reduces the amount of youngster that may eventually choose to pursuit a football career but that can't be a reason (or excuse) to open the border to more immigrants. Otherwise how come small countries with very little immigration like Croatia and Uruguay are so good and they only have a few million citizens?

Let me share my perspective about this matter, where football is considered as best sport and gives the opportunity to make money for a player then where more people will be interested in doing it. You said why India and China can't able to find 11 good players is because in India cricket is where money rains so every youngster from their childhood dream of becoming a cricketer than a football or javelin throw player but ofcourse India is also now focusing on improving their football participation by replicating something called ISL after the success of IPL (for cricket).

India has been investing a lot of money in cricket for a long time, but they do not invest that much money in football, which is why every generation of Indians dreams of becoming a cricketer when they grow up. I think if 10 young people in India are asked about their future plans, then maybe eight out of these ten will say that they want to be cricketers, and out of these 10, maybe not even one will say that they want to be a footballer. The situation of India's football ranking is not good, due to which the youth do not see a good future here, that is why they try to take cricket as their career instead of football. Even if India invests a lot of money to form a good football team in their country from now on, it will still take many more years for India to build a good team. So I think that for a good footballer to come out of a country, that country needs to have a good football background.

[Franctoshi]

Next qualifier matches aren't far away from us anymore. Only a week left for them to be underway...

As for CONMEBOL... All top 5 teams in the standings have already kind of guaranteed their qualification for the WC. Colombia are still under a little threat mathematically.

Interestingly their remaining matches are also against Venezuela and Bolivia.    Only one point is enough for Colombia to secure their direct qualification too. I think they'll do it easily.

Meanwhile, Brazil will most likely finish as the runnerup in the standings, their performance has improved after being taken over by Ancelotti.

I think I agree with you, Ancelotti taking charge of the Brazilian team can make them to even win the world cup if people underrate them in the world cup. The team already has some quality players and some stars in their team and what they needed was a good coach and thanks to the coming of Ancelotti, we may be on the verge of witnessing a revivived Brazilian team we to know before and enjoy their football under Carlo Ancelotti's watch.

[Ale88]

Every country has programs to improve its sport. Even though China failed to qualify for the 2026 World Cup, it doesn't mean they don't care about their football. It's just that Indonesia might have been luckier in the previous round, managing to beat China. As far as I know, at the Asian level, China's sport (in general, nit just football) was impoved, which means there are programs to improve football as well. However, Japan and Australia aren't weak teams that China can easily defeat, so that might be another reason why China failed to qualify.

However, the reason the Chinese national team’s performance has declined so drastically is due to several systemic issues. These include an underdeveloped football academy system, a lack of youth participation in pursuing football as a career, a domestic league recently shaken by scandals and the bankruptcy of many clubs, and the strong influence of politics, which makes players and coaches play too cautiously out of fear of being punished by their president. All of these factors combined are causing serious problems for the Chinese national team at the moment.

If they had been able to better maintain their football ecosystem from the start, perhaps these problems could have been avoided. Chinese football once enjoyed a golden age, with massive club investment and government support, which even attracted world-class players. However, corruption, dependence on investors, and various scandals have damaged their football ecosystem, and the impact continues to this day.

The Chinese national team has always been very bad, that is no news. And I wouldn't say they ever had a golden age because bringing in a ton of foreign players while you don't develop the local players is far from a golden age, they simply spent a ton of money on wages, that's it. Which is the same that is happening with Saudi Arabia: the local players are still very bad, paying 200 millions/year to a 40 years old Ronaldo doesn't change the fact that the national team can't beat other weak teams.

[Mr Reporter]

Of course demographics have an impact because it reduces the amount of youngster that may eventually choose to pursuit a football career but that can't be a reason (or excuse) to open the border to more immigrants. Otherwise how come small countries with very little immigration like Croatia and Uruguay are so good and they only have a few million citizens?

Let me share my perspective about this matter, where football is considered as best sport and gives the opportunity to make money for a player then where more people will be interested in doing it. You said why India and China can't able to find 11 good players is because in India cricket is where money rains so every youngster from their childhood dream of becoming a cricketer than a football or javelin throw player but ofcourse India is also now focusing on improving their football participation by replicating something called ISL after the success of IPL (for cricket).

India has been investing a lot of money in cricket for a long time, but they do not invest that much money in football, which is why every generation of Indians dreams of becoming a cricketer when they grow up. I think if 10 young people in India are asked about their future plans, then maybe eight out of these ten will say that they want to be cricketers, and out of these 10, maybe not even one will say that they want to be a footballer. The situation of India's football ranking is not good, due to which the youth do not see a good future here, that is why they try to take cricket as their career instead of football. Even if India invests a lot of money to form a good football team in their country from now on, it will still take many more years for India to build a good team. So I think that for a good footballer to come out of a country, that country needs to have a good football background.

I think you right about building a stronger football team takes time to build a strong football team effort and investment, pulse a good football background, which include infrastructure, coaching and support, can help nurture talented players and improve the sports over all standards.  And aslo India football team face challenges in terms of ranking and development, which it making it looks harder for the young player's to see a future in football and in sports in total.

[Sithara007]

I think you right about building a stronger football team takes time to build a strong football team effort and investment, pulse a good football background, which include infrastructure, coaching and support, can help nurture talented players and improve the sports over all standards.  And aslo India football team face challenges in terms of ranking and development, which it making it looks harder for the young player's to see a future in football and in sports in total.

From what I can see, in India sports is not valued a lot. Youngsters are forced to spend 12-14 hours a day on studies, and sports is not regarded as a career option. Even in rare cases where it is regarded as a career option, that is applicable only for cricket and not for the other sports. You will find a lot of fans for various clubs such as Manchester United and Inter Milan in India. But that said, most of these fans will never play the sport themselves. And the absence of open space is also an issue in India.

[armanda90]

Brazil's national team head coach Carlo Ancelotti have announced squad team for upcoming two qualifying matches against Chile and Bolivia, little interested there are not any players from Real Madrid from Rorygo, Vinicius Jr and Eder Militao. Seems its first time for Vinicius Jr or Rodrygo not get national team calling, I think Ancelotti want to make rotation for two qualifying matches left because Brazil have been qualified to FIFA World Cup 2026 not matter the result from two matches left.

Upcoming qualifying match, Brazil will face Chile at Friday 5th September and last qualifying match against Bolivia, its not really important match for Brazil but securing six points of two games will secure the top 2nd standings position finish.

Here Brazil's squad list

source

[pewboy]

Every country has programs to improve its sport. Even though China failed to qualify for the 2026 World Cup, it doesn't mean they don't care about their football. It's just that Indonesia might have been luckier in the previous round, managing to beat China. As far as I know, at the Asian level, China's sport (in general, nit just football) was impoved, which means there are programs to improve football as well. However, Japan and Australia aren't weak teams that China can easily defeat, so that might be another reason why China failed to qualify.

China has traditionally been cultivating other sports, football is not in their interest and hasn't been for a while and I understand that, it has never been practiced to the fullest and that's why they can't build a strong team for the World Cup, their championship is rather mediocre and this means that they don't grow and don't produce players suitable for such a competition.

[cande86]

Brazil's national team head coach Carlo Ancelotti have announced squad team for upcoming two qualifying matches against Chile and Bolivia, little interested there are not any players from Real Madrid from Rorygo, Vinicius Jr and Eder Militao. Seems its first time for Vinicius Jr or Rodrygo not get national team calling, I think Ancelotti want to make rotation for two qualifying matches left because Brazil have been qualified to FIFA World Cup 2026 not matter the result from two matches left.

Upcoming qualifying match, Brazil will face Chile at Friday 5th September and last qualifying match against Bolivia, its not really important match for Brazil but securing six points of two games will secure the top 2nd standings position finish.

Here Brazil's squad list

source

Get ready because Brazil will return to being a really great team that will cause havoc this year, I am really confident in Ancelotti, I have seen him coach several teams and I am sure he will do a good job with the guys he already knows, let him work and you will see what satisfaction he will give

[Bitcoin Smith]

I think you right about building a stronger football team takes time to build a strong football team effort and investment, pulse a good football background, which include infrastructure, coaching and support, can help nurture talented players and improve the sports over all standards.  And aslo India football team face challenges in terms of ranking and development, which it making it looks harder for the young player's to see a future in football and in sports in total.

From what I can see, in India sports is not valued a lot. Youngsters are forced to spend 12-14 hours a day on studies, and sports is not regarded as a career option. Even in rare cases where it is regarded as a career option, that is applicable only for cricket and not for the other sports.

This is completely false, sports is part of academics such as schools and colleges and even we have dedicated quota for sports for college and even for government jobs that encourages the youngsters to play but what we lack is the infrastructure to take this to the next level. As of now their goal is to get a government job like in railways by playing sports that is why the best players are sitting at clerical jobs.

In India the business for football is no where compared to cricket and the same goes for every sports in India and cricket is kind of curse in that way that just dragged every kids to fantasize about becoming a cricketer because they can get rich and million dollar ad sponsors and many more while other successful athletes may not even make any money even if they achieve the greatest height they can go.

[Tonimez]

I think you right about building a stronger football team takes time to build a strong football team effort and investment, pulse a good football background, which include infrastructure, coaching and support, can help nurture talented players and improve the sports over all standards.  And aslo India football team face challenges in terms of ranking and development, which it making it looks harder for the young player's to see a future in football and in sports in total.

From what I can see, in India sports is not valued a lot. Youngsters are forced to spend 12-14 hours a day on studies, and sports is not regarded as a career option. Even in rare cases where it is regarded as a career option, that is applicable only for cricket and not for the other sports. You will find a lot of fans for various clubs such as Manchester United and Inter Milan in India. But that said, most of these fans will never play the sport themselves. And the absence of open space is also an issue in India.

The world is more advanced for this your claim to be true. What I can say is that they are late to embrace the game as a profession. India football federation founded the Indian super league in 2013 with 14 clubs currently participating in it. Every country has their backwards area but I can tell you that this your description is too loud to describe an evolving football federation. You cannot compare even the US football federation to that of the English or German.  But this does not undermine the fact that India is seriously developing their football participation. They would eventually  join the world cup maybe by 2030 because even their ban has been lifted by FIFA

[Lidger]

I think you right about building a stronger football team takes time to build a strong football team effort and investment, pulse a good football background, which include infrastructure, coaching and support, can help nurture talented players and improve the sports over all standards.  And aslo India football team face challenges in terms of ranking and development, which it making it looks harder for the young player's to see a future in football and in sports in total.

However, if the Indian team can qualify for the main stage of the World Cup once, then the popularity of their football will increase a lot and they will see many good footballers in the pipeline every year. Now the question is how India will qualify for the main stage of the World Cup despite being so low in the rankings. We know that India has a huge population, this can be a big business for FIFA. If it is possible that FIFA organizes a World Cup tournament in India, then the football craze in India will surpass all past records. Besides, as the host team, India will be able to directly qualify for the main stage of the World Cup. This will not only benefit FIFA financially, but also improve the Indian football team. However, to do this, India will have to invest a lot of money. ‌

I think there is another disadvantage in initially organizing the World Cup in India, for example, the price of a normal ticket in other countries is very high, in that case, if the ticket price is very high in India, will Indian citizens buy tickets at such a high price and sit in the stadium to watch the World Cup?

[Volgastallion]

As i said before i really support the idea of Neymar being again in the "convocacao" list, but come on i heard in some media outlets from brazil they were furious about Ancelotti not calling him for this last two matches for qualyfication.

But what they have in their heads? He is playing pretty bad right now.

[Sithara007]

The world is more advanced for this your claim to be true. What I can say is that they are late to embrace the game as a profession. India football federation founded the Indian super league in 2013 with 14 clubs currently participating in it. Every country has their backwards area but I can tell you that this your description is too loud to describe an evolving football federation. You cannot compare even the US football federation to that of the English or German.  But this does not undermine the fact that India is seriously developing their football participation. They would eventually  join the world cup maybe by 2030 because even their ban has been lifted by FIFA

LOL.. India qualifying for the FIFA World Cup? That will remain as a pipe-dream. Cricket is devouring all other sports in India. Even in regions where football used to be popular (such as Kerala and Bengal), it is losing out to cricket. The biggest issue is that the national football federation is extremely corrupt. They came up with the Indian Super League (ISL) in 2013, but at the same time they allowed the older parallel league (I-League) to continue. And this in turn negatively impacted both the tournaments.

[Slow death]

Next qualifier matches aren't far away from us anymore. Only a week left for them to be underway...

As for CONMEBOL... All top 5 teams in the standings have already kind of guaranteed their qualification for the WC. Colombia are still under a little threat mathematically.

Interestingly their remaining matches are also against Venezuela and Bolivia.    Only one point is enough for Colombia to secure their direct qualification too. I think they'll do it easily.

Colombia will most likely succeed in securing a direct ticket to the next 2026 World Cup, on paper, they are more favored than Bolivia and Venezuela. If Uruguay and Paraguay drop points, Colombia even has a chance to finish in a better position. Meanwhile, Brazil will most likely finish as the runnerup in the standings, their performance has improved after being taken over by .

Well, I read somewhere that Ancelotti will put other players in the next games. He intends to test other players to have more options, which means that Brazil's chances of dropping points will be even greater. But since they're already qualified, what matters now for Ancelotti is to experiment. He will take this opportunity to play against desperate opponents who will play at full strength while he puts new players in to test their potential.

If I were a coach, I would do the same thing. I see no reason to call up all the best players for a game where they're already qualified. The ideal would be to call up those who never had a chance and put them in to play. Now, about Venezuela qualifying, I said here that they need to pray, because it will be very difficult.

[Ale88]

Brazil's national team head coach Carlo Ancelotti have announced squad team for upcoming two qualifying matches against Chile and Bolivia, little interested there are not any players from Real Madrid from Rorygo, Vinicius Jr and Eder Militao. Seems its first time for Vinicius Jr or Rodrygo not get national team calling, I think Ancelotti want to make rotation for two qualifying matches left because Brazil have been qualified to FIFA World Cup 2026 not matter the result from two matches left.

Upcoming qualifying match, Brazil will face Chile at Friday 5th September and last qualifying match against Bolivia, its not really important match for Brazil but securing six points of two games will secure the top 2nd standings position finish.

Here Brazil's squad list

The names on the list are simply dreadful, I don't know how else describe them. Of course it's not Ancelotti's fault, those are the players Brazil is currently producing. Once they had Roberto Carlos and then Marcelo, now there is Alex Sandro. They used to have defenders like Lucio and Thiago Silva and now the best one is Marquinhos, which is very good, but not as good the the others I mentioned. Midfielders? Players like Juninho Pernambucano often times weren't even called because they had better players, now he would be by far the best midfielder. And maybe it's better not to talk about the strikers: the fact that a 33 year old Neymar is the best attacking player they have speaks volume. Let's see if Raphinha keeps playing like he did last season.

[Sithara007]

The names on the list are simply dreadful, I don't know how else describe them. Of course it's not Ancelotti's fault, those are the players Brazil is currently producing. Once they had Roberto Carlos and then Marcelo, now there is Alex Sandro. They used to have defenders like Lucio and Thiago Silva and now the best one is Marquinhos, which is very good, but not as good the the others I mentioned. Midfielders? Players like Juninho Pernambucano often times weren't even called because they had better players, now he would be by far the best midfielder. And maybe it's better not to talk about the strikers: the fact that a 33 year old Neymar is the best attacking player they have speaks volume. Let's see if Raphinha keeps playing like he did last season.

Neymar is 33 years old and injury prone. And despite that the Brazilian team is heavily dependent on him. They don't have any other good forwards apart from Neymar and this is a good proof of how much the game has deteriorated in Brazil during the last 10 years or so. At one stage, it looked as if Brazil will not qualify for the 2026 FIFA World Cup. That concern is no longer valid, but their performance during the CONMEBOL qualifiers was definitely not up to the expectations.