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

[HyperCodexV]

It is 100% politics and nothing more, in fact it is so much so that we are talking about a very shitty situation. I understand it became news because of Italy not being qualified, if they won, and Bosnia did not, then we would not be hearing about this, but it has always been political.

The only reason why teams from Asia and north America ever go to world cup is because they are given a chance, and because of that they play, otherwise they would not have a single chance to beat any European qualifiers. If we are talking about putting lets say USA or Canada or Mexico for example into Europe battles and see how they do, we would see them lose out very early on, be the last place in any group they are put in.

FIFA tries to give different regions a chance so the World Cup can be truly global, not just dominated by Europe. That’s why teams from Asia and North America also qualify. And to be fair, some of those teams can actually compete. For example, Saudi Arabia beat Argentina in the 2022 World Cup and Morocco went all the way to the semi finals. Also, the usa has given strong teams tough matches in past tournaments.

[Lillominato89]

That's not the way of looking into this. CONMEBOL has so few teams, because in the South American continent we have big countries such as Brazil and Colombia, whose population is greater than the most populous country in Europe. On the other hand, there are a number of European countries such as Andorra, San Marino and Monaco, where the population is not even 100k. In terms of total population, South America has roughly the same numbers as Europe. Given this, I don't find anything wrong with 6 teams qualifying from CONMEBOL and 16 qualifying from UEFA.

Whoever is stronger qualifies.
Guys, this is not a question of politics, but of sport. The deserving teams qualify, the shitty teams, sorry I have to say.. like Italy. They're outside.

There's no way that because you're from a continent you necessarily have to qualify.

How true your words are!
Sadly, it hurts, but it’s the truth: only those who earn their place in the World Cup get to go; those who’ve been rubbish for years now, like Italy, deserve to watch it on TV yet again. Thank goodness we’ve got players labelled as top players – just imagine if we didn’t have a single one!

[Franctoshi]

I really don't know how solid the news is but there's a news circulating that Gattuso has resigned rom his role as the Italy national team coach after he couldn't lead his team to the world cup. Italy couldn't make it directly to the world cup but it's qualifiers and was drawn in a playoff, their match against Bosnia was the game that should have earned them the ticket but they blew that chance. Italy were ahead in the match but got a red card in the closing minutes of the first half, I believe that one man down was one of the reasons why they couldn't hold on but nevertheless, Italy has even been poor in recent years so it's not like they are one solid side. As for the part of him leaving far away from Italy, I don't think he would do that, these men just talk and that's it.

Even though that Gattuso leaves far away from Italy it doesn't change the fact that him and the entire team has failed their country, and having had the second chance to qualify their country for the world cup competition and they still blew that very chance out, Is very disappointing. Both Gattuso and the entire Italian national team that participated in that qualifiers should take the blame because they didn't do quite enough.

[Italian Panic]

That's not the way of looking into this. CONMEBOL has so few teams, because in the South American continent we have big countries such as Brazil and Colombia, whose population is greater than the most populous country in Europe. On the other hand, there are a number of European countries such as Andorra, San Marino and Monaco, where the population is not even 100k. In terms of total population, South America has roughly the same numbers as Europe. Given this, I don't find anything wrong with 6 teams qualifying from CONMEBOL and 16 qualifying from UEFA.

Whoever is stronger qualifies.
Guys, this is not a question of politics, but of sport. The deserving teams qualify, the shitty teams, sorry I have to say.. like Italy. They're outside.

There's no way that because you're from a continent you necessarily have to qualify.

How true your words are!
Sadly, it hurts, but it’s the truth: only those who earn their place in the World Cup get to go; those who’ve been rubbish for years now, like Italy, deserve to watch it on TV yet again. Thank goodness we’ve got players labelled as top players – just imagine if we didn’t have a single one!

Yes, you’re right, lillominato. I remember the days when Del Piero and Totti were on the bench because we had more amazing player in attack; now it would be a miracle to have even half that. I remember Pirlo running the midfield and Maldini and Cannavaro keeping Nesta on the bench!! Italy are really in a bad way now.

[$crypto$]

I wish the number of teams joining the World Cup didn't ever change from 32 to 48.

In my opinion sooner than ever will have a 64-team World Cup. This is the new path: more teams, more matches, more money. Football's quality? It doesn't matter. They completely ruined the tournament.

Hahaha if 64 teams then the match can be 2 months or 1 month full of matches without any breaks, FIFA does not care about the quality of the match as long as there are many then there will be a lot of support.
Well we just enjoy this new format, we can't argue anything because FIFA has the power about it.

[Lillominato89]

That's not the way of looking into this. CONMEBOL has so few teams, because in the South American continent we have big countries such as Brazil and Colombia, whose population is greater than the most populous country in Europe. On the other hand, there are a number of European countries such as Andorra, San Marino and Monaco, where the population is not even 100k. In terms of total population, South America has roughly the same numbers as Europe. Given this, I don't find anything wrong with 6 teams qualifying from CONMEBOL and 16 qualifying from UEFA.

Whoever is stronger qualifies.
Guys, this is not a question of politics, but of sport. The deserving teams qualify, the shitty teams, sorry I have to say.. like Italy. They're outside.

There's no way that because you're from a continent you necessarily have to qualify.

How true your words are!
Sadly, it hurts, but it’s the truth: only those who earn their place in the World Cup get to go; those who’ve been rubbish for years now, like Italy, deserve to watch it on TV yet again. Thank goodness we’ve got players labelled as top players – just imagine if we didn’t have a single one!

Yes, you’re right, lillominato. I remember the days when Del Piero and Totti were on the bench because we had more amazing player in attack; now it would be a miracle to have even half that. I remember Pirlo running the midfield and Maldini and Cannavaro keeping Nesta on the bench!! Italy are really in a bad way now.

Those were the golden years of Italian football, now a distant memory.
Italy chose not to follow in the footsteps of modern football and has become stuck in its ways.
No top-tier Italian club is really investing in young Italian players; in the past, they were the first to invest in the future.
I still remember perfectly well when Inter, Milan or Juventus were made up of practically only Italian players and just a few foreigners; that saved us for many years! Now it’s the complete opposite.

[LUCKMCFLY]

Italy didn't win, this is a total defeat for everyone, for the entire Italian football system, which was unable to survive 90 minutes against a team that is worth 10 times less and that doesn't have all the talent available, it seems absurd to me, but these are football matches and it had to go like this, it will be the next one.

And I firmly believed that Italy would go to the World Cup because they have a very good league. It has grown, but it has really grown because of the contributions of other players who aren't Italian. It's a shame, but watching the Italians play, I think they lack heart. I don't know, they have to do better. You couldn't see the desire. Bosnia did have that heart Besides Italy, Bolivia couldn't either. I see it as something good because Bolivia has always taken advantage of the altitude of La Paz to get points Fair results? Yes, that's football.

[Ale88]

Europe is a home of soccer they are doing very well plus the league they have but however FIFA has been very fair to them in the number of countries that's coming from their to play the world cup this year because I believe Europe has the highest number of countries in one content to play the world cup because out of the total number and they gave them 16 is actually a lot, even the continent which is regarded as the largest has only few countries that is coming to the world cup, so actually I was even thinking they're the ones who could have ask for more countries to be added for them.

So if think Europe already has too many spots and instead you would give more spots to other federations, what would you change? Because right now we have:

• 9-10 from CAF (Africa)
• 8-9 from AFC (Asia)
• 6-8 from CONCACAF (North/Central America/Caribbean)
• 6-7 from CONMEBOL (South America)
• 1-2 from OFC (Oceania)

So which federations in your opinion deserve more spots? I'm curious to hear your motivation because I don't see any reason to give more spots to other federations, and looking at the level of the teams that qualified at this World Cup several federations already have too many spots.

[Sithara007]

• 9-10 from CAF (Africa)
• 8-9 from AFC (Asia)
• 6-8 from CONCACAF (North/Central America/Caribbean)
• 6-7 from CONMEBOL (South America)
• 1-2 from OFC (Oceania)

So which federations in your opinion deserve more spots? I'm curious to hear your motivation because I don't see any reason to give more spots to other federations, and looking at the level of the teams that qualified at this World Cup several federations already have too many spots.

IMO, the current allocation just works fine. UEFA has 16 slots, while all the other confederations have single digits. What I would have liked is equal numbers for CAF and AFC, as the quality is similar. As things stand, CAF has one extra slot compared to AFC. The only confederation which seems to have a higher than deserving number is CONCACAF. The competition is pretty weak there, and the weakest teams participating in this edition of the world cup qualified from there (Curaçao, Panama and Haiti). Suriname also qualified for the Inter-confederation play-offs from the CONCACAF region.

[m4r1o]

Russia already made a request during Olympic qualifiers to move to Asian region, but IOC rejected that request. They may follow this trend for the other sports as well. Out of the list that you provided, only Türkiye is not an EU member. All the other countries are founding members of the European Union.

Also, you misunderstood my statement. What I said is that Russia is the only populated country in Europe outside the EU. I was not talking about Germany or France, as they are included in the EU. But yes, I missed Türkiye.

this is something that clearly needs to be reviewed, there are countries considered UEFA that are absolutely not and i believe that this absolutely needs to change because this makes it much more difficult for other national teams to qualify since places are few, adding even more difficulties does not seem appropriate to me

[Rikafip]

I wish the number of teams joining the World Cup didn't ever change from 32 to 48.

This is just the preparation for another expansion to 64 teams.

I think it's unreal that we actually have to explain this concept. Also because I don't understand where his idea could come from, is there a single sport/competition in the world that privileges the country with the highest population instead of the best one? Because I don't think so.

No other explanation other than pure ignorance on the matter.

And based on that idea, countries like yours (Croatia) and Uruguay basically shouldn't even be allowed to play.

True, with population less than 4 million, what's the point of even having Croatia at the WC? Give our spot to India or Bangladesh, I am sure that they would perform better than our 2nd and 3rd spot at the last two World Cups, given how much bigger they are.  

[SilverCryptoBullet]

If the whole situation came down to a single player getting a red card causing them to lose the world cup chance, then the problem is much bigger than that. Italy should have been already gone, and easily be winning. Bosnia is not at the level of Italy, they do not have the financials to do what Italians do and yet they have looked better, and we are blaming just luck or something?

Italy should have been at the world cup, no Italy in 2018 no Italy in 2022 and now no Italy in 2026 that is just shameful. They should be considering how this could change for the long term and they need to make sure they could do a lot better. Otherwise this is not going to work well for them at all, we are talking about much worse situation.

Italy are stronger than some clubs that are eligible for World Cup 2026 like in the Europe, it's Sweden. A national team ended group qualification at the bottom rank but were eligible to join playoffs and win them to be eligible for World Cup 2026. This World Cup qualification format in Europe must be changed like Gennaro Gattuso complained months ago.

Bosnia did their great jobs in both playoff matches but a World Cup without Italy is like something important missing especially if we look back on the journey of Sweden towards World Cup 2026. It's very unfair for Italy but it's fact that Italy must restructure their national football system in order to build up stronger national team in coming years. Otherwise, they will possibly miss a next World Cup in 2030, and to avoid that nightmare, they must take severe action from now.

[Ale88]

This is why I highly suggested that we should be making a "world qualifier" to everyone, because that would make things more fair. I do not know how many teams are in FIFA, how many nations participate in these qualifiers, but take it from all around the world from every single part, and put them into a single world qualifier. No more 12 from Europe 5 from there and 6 from there etc etc, no more continents at all.

We put every single nation into groups, and those groups battle each other, that way you will see Italy play against Jordan too, or Norway against Qatar too etc, and Tahiti or whatever will have to face France too. Lets see how many teams actually go to world cup from each nation. Then we can discuss if a team was good or not, I guarantee you that Italy would be in every single year that way.

Your proposal could be fascinating but logistically it would be a nightmare: clubs and fans already already fed up with too many national teams matches, how would you manage such proposal? All teams from each group should play on neutral fields because you can't play one day in Qatar and then you fly to New Zealand and then to Paraguay, it's not sustainable.

There are 211 national teams affiliated to FIFA, you can't send teams around the whole world. Instead I would improve the current system which has many problems.

I wish the number of teams joining the World Cup didn't ever change from 32 to 48.

In my opinion sooner than ever will have a 64-team World Cup. This is the new path: more teams, more matches, more money. Football's quality? It doesn't matter. They completely ruined the tournament.

Hahaha if 64 teams then the match can be 2 months or 1 month full of matches without any breaks, FIFA does not care about the quality of the match as long as there are many then there will be a lot of support.
Well we just enjoy this new format, we can't argue anything because FIFA has the power about it.

You laugh but just Google it and you can see there already are proposals, and we're talking about 2030 WC.

[$crypto$]

So there was news that the Italian players demanded 300K euros if they could beat Bosnia and qualify --- but in reality the national team still lost.

Is it because of the factor of their demands not being fulfilled by the Federation so that they play not full of enthusiasm? I know every player needs money, but usually for a country's match they often don't think about that and are more devoted.

I don't know if this statement is their failure to qualify, or if it's true that Italy is bad, but I saw this news on X.

[Alex077]

Italy didn't win, this is a total defeat for everyone, for the entire Italian football system, which was unable to survive 90 minutes against a team that is worth 10 times less and that doesn't have all the talent available, it seems absurd to me, but these are football matches and it had to go like this, it will be the next one.

And I firmly believed that Italy would go to the World Cup because they have a very good league. It has grown, but it has really grown because of the contributions of other players who aren't Italian. It's a shame, but watching the Italians play, I think they lack heart. I don't know, they have to do better. You couldn't see the desire. Bosnia did have that heart Besides Italy, Bolivia couldn't either. I see it as something good because Bolivia has always taken advantage of the altitude of La Paz to get points Fair results? Yes, that's football.

Italy not making the World Cup for three times in a row is definitely unexpected. I honestly expected this to happen when things went to penalties. We all know that they do not have a good track record with penalties. All started with Roberto Baggio. And now they are losing in the penalties against a team that probably nobody expected to be in the World Cup. I guess they’re just not a good team anymore.

Also, what’s up with Donnarumma? This guy getting rage baited by almost anything nowadays. Like Bruv, it’s not the opponents fault that your team is shit.

[LUCKMCFLY]

Congo and Iraq are in a tough group. Therefore, it will be very difficult for them to advance from these groups. However, I would love for them to surprise everyone and qualify. Right now, I see Japan as the strongest team from Asia. In their last friendly match, they beat England away. Perhaps they can perform very well again in the World Cup. Curaçao, Cape Verde, and Panama are considered the weakest teams in this tournament. The match between Germany and Curaçao could be a high-scoring one.

I really like all the changes that have happened in football The fact that the number of teams has increased is something I like even more because it means more football for us to enjoy, which is great. However, regarding these new teams, it's because they have undoubtedly demonstrated quality but what I love most about Japan is how they play they have my full support and will do a great job.

[retreat]

The sad truth that Italy hasn't had a national team for years now, the results speak for themselves, you have to be realistic and accept the situation.
Maybe Italy as a team can participate in other competitions, but football at the moment and we see it in clubs too is poor.
It's not unfair if they play badly they don't deserve to win, that's how it works, regardless of who you play with. The quality of play changes the lot.

Blame those who don't take the development of their football ecosystem seriously. If they had seriously read Roberto Baggio's 900-page, comprehensive reform plan for the Italian Football Federation in 2011, they might not be where they are today. But they ignored it and dismissed the report as rubbish. And it's evident that they are currently struggling to qualify for the World Cup because they didn't take it seriously and were too proud of their achievements when other football federations had already made massive improvements to their football structures.

[famososMuertos]

• 9-10 from CAF (Africa)
• 8-9 from AFC (Asia)
• 6-8 from CONCACAF (North/Central America/Caribbean)
• 6-7 from CONMEBOL (South America)
• 1-2 from OFC (Oceania)

So which federations in your opinion deserve more spots? I'm curious to hear your motivation because I don't see any reason to give more spots to other federations, and looking at the level of the teams that qualified at this World Cup several federations already have too many spots.

IMO, the current allocation just works fine. UEFA has 16 slots, while all the other confederations have single digits. What I would have liked is equal numbers for CAF and AFC, as the quality is similar. As things stand, CAF has one extra slot compared to AFC. The only confederation which seems to have a higher than deserving number is CONCACAF. The competition is pretty weak there, and the weakest teams participating in this edition of the world cup qualified from there (Curaçao, Panama and Haiti). Suriname also qualified for the Inter-confederation play-offs from the CONCACAF region.

::///:::

It's awful, even though they're from my continent and not my confederation. I should support them, and without a doubt, every country qualifying for the World Cup is exciting... but I think the World Cup attracts teams that should give that extra bit of football to prove they deserve to be there.

Many elite sports nowadays try to give that opportunity to elite teams. For example, Italy should have a double chance because they're world champions, as should Bolivia, which isn't. In other words, I'd rather watch or wait for these extra qualifying matches than see those mediocre teams in the World Cup.

And the worst is yet to come when there are 64 teams... it's awful. That improvement comes from television rights: more matches, more money for FIFA. It's a real shame how the World Cup has become. Inclusive doesn't mean more quantity, but more quality.

We already saw something similar in the Olympics, where there were competitors who were far below par and achieving extremely poor times. An example of this is weightlifting. It's a different story, but it reflects the idea that quantity is prioritized over quality, even though for them it means financial (television benefits.)

[Unknown01]

I really don't know how solid the news is but there's a news circulating that Gattuso has resigned rom his role as the Italy national team coach after he couldn't lead his team to the world cup. Italy couldn't make it directly to the world cup but it's qualifiers and was drawn in a playoff, their match against Bosnia was the game that should have earned them the ticket but they blew that chance. Italy were ahead in the match but got a red card in the closing minutes of the first half, I believe that one man down was one of the reasons why they couldn't hold on but nevertheless, Italy has even been poor in recent years so it's not like they are one solid side. As for the part of him leaving far away from Italy, I don't think he would do that, these men just talk and that's it.

Even though that Gattuso leaves far away from Italy it doesn't change the fact that him and the entire team has failed their country, and having had the second chance to qualify their country for the world cup competition and they still blew that very chance out, Is very disappointing. Both Gattuso and the entire Italian national team that participated in that qualifiers should take the blame because they didn't do quite enough.

The Italian national team is simply lacking top-class players. Just a few years ago, they had players like Chiellini and Buffon and if you go back even further, there were players like Pirlo, Cannavaro, Maldini, Totti and Del Piero, to name a few.

Who do they have now? Their squad is simply too weak and in my opinion, Gattuso wasn’t the best choice as manager either. What a shame!

[Dump3er]

The Italian national team is simply lacking top-class players. Just a few years ago, they had players like Chiellini and Buffon and if you go back even further, there were players like Pirlo, Cannavaro, Maldini, Totti and Del Piero, to name a few.

Who do they have now? Their squad is simply too weak and in my opinion, Gattuso wasn’t the best choice as manager either. What a shame!

I am not convinced of Gattuso either, but perhaps they were hoping that Gattuso is like Diego Simeone and they needed a coach who is going to push the team more effectively. Though I fully agree with you that there isn't enough quality in the team. All the names you just mentioned reminded me again of how many superstars Italy had in the past. Italy was given a present by Bosnia when the goalkeeper made that big mistake, but it was still not enough for them because of that stupid red card. It is still first half of the game, Italy got the lead and still the defender risks a red card. As a coach I would tell my players to not risk a red card so early and rather give the Bosnia player a chance to score, but he wasn't even in the center, he was quite far left and I doubt it would have been an easy goal. To then tackle him and risk a red card is not very smart and it decided the game in the end. I imagine that Italy would have made it if they did not receive that red card and instead played with full squad until the end.