World Cup 2026

[Baird of the land]

1 hour ago, die Mannyschaft said:

Is that his brother in goal ?

 

Yep it is.

shea got a very nice assist for the n.i goal.

[TheAlehouseBrawlers]

Agree with many others about the flat build up to this World Cup, so much about this tournament is just crap. I felt the same about Qatar but did find myself getting into it more than I thought I would as it went on.

Don't know how younger fans feel about it today, World Cups and FA Cup finals felt so special when growing up. I was around for 1966 but remember nothing about it (although I was given a World Cup Willie glove puppet!), 1970 was the first time I became aware of it and really started to get into football. There was something exciting hearing commentary that sounded like it was coming down a ropey phone line that made everything seem so far away and exotic.

As I was young and just so into anything football, the 1974 is my favourite ever WC closely followed by 1978 (even though England failed to reach either, I was devastated). 1982 and 1990 are also up there as most-liked.

Collecting Esso World Cup coins, small player bust figures and filling Panini sticker albums were all the rage in our house in the early seventies.

Edited 17 hours ago by TheAlehouseBrawlers

[badgerx16]

One of the African referees has been denied entry to the US.

 

I really hope the games are played in half empty stadia, and the tournament as a whole is remembered as a flop.

[mikec]

2 hours ago, TheAlehouseBrawlers said:

...

Collecting Esso World Cup coins, small player bust figures and filling Panini sticker albums were all the rage in our house in the early seventies.

I still have my full collection of Esso World Cup coins featuring the 1970 England squad, all fixed to the mounting board.

I also have the record of the squad singing "Back Home".

Edited 14 hours ago by mikec

[Holmes_and_Watson]

176 000 tickets still available for the opening group phase.

Not that a lot of them are cheap. But the touts, sorry resellers, are holding on for as long as possible. And they were overpriced in the first place.

 

[Stripey McStripe Shirt]

1 hour ago, Holmes_and_Watson said:

176 000 tickets still available for the opening group phase.

Not that a lot of them are cheap. But the touts, sorry resellers, are holding on for as long as possible. And they were overpriced in the first place.

 

Sounds like a big number, but spread across the hundreds of group games at this tournament, most stadiums will appear largely full on TV probably.

No doubt FIFA will begrudgingly give away 1000s for free too to bulk out this shittest games.

[M271]

1 hour ago, mikec said:

I still have my full collection of Esso World Cup coins featuring the 1970 England squad, all fixed to the mounting board.

I also have the record of the squad singing "Back Home".

Nurd alert here, it has always stuck in my memory that the b side of “back home” was a track called “ Cinnamon Stick”. I’ve always wanted it to come up in a pop quiz but never will.

[Holmes_and_Watson]

8 minutes ago, Stripey McStripe Shirt said:

Sounds like a big number, but spread across the hundreds of group games at this tournament, most stadiums will appear largely full on TV probably.

No doubt FIFA will begrudgingly give away 1000s for free too to bulk out this shittest games.

Approx 2.5 thousand per game. So, yeah, largely there. 

As you say, some will have more available than others. Infantino racing round outside, desperately giving away tickets for free is a nice image.

[sydney_saint]

I don't mind the expanded format. I'm much more interested in watching Uzbekistan vs DRC than I am watching Switzerland slugging it out with Portugal. But everything else in this world cup, at least from the USA side, is a shambles. Looks highly likely that it will be the worst WC of all time. I feel sad for Omar Artan. Like the players, the WC is an absolute pinnacle for his career. Imagine all that hard work and graft, and he does everything right to get into the country, and is turned away. And then FIFA turn their back on him as well

 

[M271]

39 minutes ago, sydney_saint said:

I don't mind the expanded format. I'm much more interested in watching Uzbekistan vs DRC than I am watching Switzerland slugging it out with Portugal. But everything else in this world cup, at least from the USA side, is a shambles. Looks highly likely that it will be the worst WC of all time. I feel sad for Omar Artan. Like the players, the WC is an absolute pinnacle for his career. Imagine all that hard work and graft, and he does everything right to get into the country, and is turned away. And then FIFA turn their back on him as well

 

I don’t know why that the refs schedules couldn’t be arranged so that Artan officiates games in Mexico or Canada, once they knew he was being turned away by USA.

[Whitey Grandad]

25 minutes ago, M271 said:

I don’t know why that the refs schedules couldn’t be arranged so that Artan officiates games in Mexico or Canada, once they knew he was being turned away by USA.

Aren't all the refs based in Florida?

[Saint NL]

Iran has had the fan tickets revoked.

https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/articles/c9q2vrdx0ewo

 

Seriously, why was America allowed to host this thing? They are a shambles

[suewhistle]

https://www.theguardian.com/football/picture/2026/jun/09/david-squires-world-cup-reimagined-gianni-infantinos-west-side-story-cartoon

Oof.. They haven't opened comments yet, I wonder why..?

 

[rallyboy]

If some fans and officials are being prevented from attending it's not really a World Cup, it's just a Trump invitational event.

Just when you thought football had no soul left to sell, it finds a little scraping left in the barrel.

 

[Midfield_General]

On 08/06/2026 at 08:22, LiberalCommunist said:

This is a very low hype tournament. Never known it to be so flat. Even Qatar had a little buzz of anticipation. 

It doesn't help that football has reached a total saturation point generally. 

In the days of Italia 90 you used to get one game a week on TV if you were lucky, plus the big cup finals - that was it.  When a World Cup came around and suddenly there were three games on a day for a month, it felt like some other-wordly event that you wanted to immerse yourself in because it was soon going to end. 

Now there are multiple matches on literally every day of the week, throughout the year, plus god knows how many summer tournaments, all of which have been expanded, plus the non-stop relentless media coverage on and offline so it's just a constant rolling feed of more football content than anyone could ever consume and it doesn't feel special anymore. Just more football matches to go on top of all the others. 

Then throw in the fact it's in the States, the 48 team format creating loads of really boring games and removing most of the jeopardy from the group stages, and half the games being on in the middle of the night, and it's a recipe for indifference, at least until the knock-outs start. 

Edited 9 hours ago by Midfield_General

[edprice1984]

The US is a different country to the one that hosted in 1994. 

Back then, they were generally seen in a positive light with the obvious caveats of not having a fucking clue about Football. 

Now 32 years on, they have become an experiment in unbounded greed and the answer to the question "What happens if you let Capitalism run amok with no guard rails?". As soon as FIFA expanded the tournament to 48 teams, only a few countries were in a position to host the thing. Also the enforced rotation of tournament hosts between different Confederations means that the US was always going to play some part. 

FIFA have also become even more corrupt during that time. Looking back at the stuff that went on under Havelange and Blatter, it almost seems quaint.

Just a slight side note around why these tournaments aren't quite as exciting as they once were. Back in the 1980's or even 90's, we didn't have quite the wall to wall football that we do now. Brazil, Argentina and other teams would still have some mystique. Now all the top players ply their trade in Europe, most in the Premier League. There will be 205 players at this World Cup who play in the Premier League, EFL and even one from the National League.

Familiarity breeds contempt to some degree.

 

[whelk]

It would be nice if there was a break away association like  LIV and PGA although not funded by Saudi state and LIV is absolutely shite. Just needs a few big European countries to break away, although never going to happen as their associations will all be on the FIFA gravy train and welcome the trough

Edited 9 hours ago by whelk

[spyinthesky]

2 hours ago, edprice1984 said:

The US is a different country to the one that hosted in 1994. 

Back then, they were generally seen in a positive light with the obvious caveats of not having a fucking clue about Football. 

Now 32 years on, they have become an experiment in unbounded greed and the answer to the question "What happens if you let Capitalism run amok with no guard rails?". As soon as FIFA expanded the tournament to 48 teams, only a few countries were in a position to host the thing. Also the enforced rotation of tournament hosts between different Confederations means that the US was always going to play some part. 

FIFA have also become even more corrupt during that time. Looking back at the stuff that went on under Havelange and Blatter, it almost seems quaint.

Just a slight side note around why these tournaments aren't quite as exciting as they once were. Back in the 1980's or even 90's, we didn't have quite the wall to wall football that we do now. Brazil, Argentina and other teams would still have some mystique. Now all the top players ply their trade in Europe, most in the Premier League. There will be 205 players at this World Cup who play in the Premier League, EFL and even one from the National League.

Familiarity breeds contempt to some degree.

 

Bring back Sir Stanley Rous as head of FIFA!!

[bpsaint]

Fair play to Ian Wright having the balls to speak out about the tournament, whilst most pundits take the cash and keep quiet. Probably get his visa revoked now.

Edited 4 hours ago by bpsaint

[hypochondriac]

The thing is there's atrocities and shit with many world cups including this one. Whether it's slave labour, despotic regimes, sportswashing, blood money, hideous prices etc etc. Once the actual games start it will all switch to that and we can start talking about the games again.