Canada makes joint bid with US & Mexico for Soccer 2026 World Cup
Getting the Soccer World Cup could have a potentially big effect on the development of soccer as a sport in Canada. For the Argos, even if Canada becomes a host country, the event is almost a decade away, giving the Argos plenty of time to right their ship before all of the media attention focuses on the World Cup.
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Canada and Mexico will only get a slice of soccer’s biggest prize if the joint North American bid for the 2026 World Cup is successful.
The proposed blueprint calls for 60 of the 80 games in the new expanded tournament format to be held in the U.S. with 10 going to Canada and 10 to Mexico.
“The final decisions on those things are up to FIFA. It’s their tournament. But that will be our proposal and that is our agreement together,” U.S. soccer president Sunil Gulati told a news conference atop the Freedom Tower in lower Manhattan.
Gulati was flanked by Victor Montagliani, president of both the Canadian Soccer Association and CONCACAF, and Mexico Football Federation president Decio de Maria.
Their agreement calls for all games from the quarter-finals on to be held in the U.S., making for a set of ground rules that will likely leave Canadian and Mexican fans feeling like Oliver Twist.
But the good news for Canada, which has qualified just once for the men’s World Cup — in 1986, when host Mexico was out of the CONCACAF qualifying picture — is the push to maintain the tradition of having the tournament host(s) automatically qualify.
https://www.thestar.com/sports/socce...-2026-bid.html
