World Cup bid shows region’s talent, diversity
Along with economy, soccer culture in our immigrant-filled community is getting a huge boost.
For a moment Thursday, it seemed Houston might have been skipped over when the televised announcement of the 2026 World Cup host cities went from Dallas to Atlanta. The bid committee’s president, Chris Canetti, said his heart rate shot up to 130 on his Apple Watch.
Then, finally, the announcement so many had been waiting for: Word that Houston will host several World Cup matches came with an eruption of joy as news spread among fans, including the region’s enormously diverse immigrant communities. You could almost hear the cheers across the city.
“This is a dream come true,” said Charles Rotramel, head of reVision Houston, the Gulfton-area nonprofit that works with youth in the community, particularly those affected by gangs or the juvenile justice system, to help build connections and support, including through sports. “We’ll go — whatever it takes. We’ll take kids to games, we’ll be part of that whole experience because that’s a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,” he said of the future matches.
Over the years, the organization’s soccer team has included players who came to Houston from all over the world, including El Salvador, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Honduras, Kenya, Mali, Mexico, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda. Rotramel recalled watching some 50 World Cup matches with the players and community back in 2018, when Russia hosted the tournament. “We’ve been talking about this with our young people since the bid (to host) was announced,” Rotramel told the editorial board. “Just even the thought of Houston hosting has been exciting for our young people.”
Houston stands to benefit mightily from fans who’ll travel from around the world to see the matches, and to stay in our hotels and dine in our restaurants. But it’s the everyday Houston-area soccer fans, so many of them immigrants, who are understandably ecstatic. They are the ones who have helped grow the sport’s popularity and ensured that when it comes time, the city will be ready to cheer, party, cry and maybe even witness a few miracles together as the diverse multitude that we are.
The international soccer authority, FIFA, made a great choice in selecting Houston.
Soccer has become a unifying passion in our diverse metropolis, a way to connect to a new home and new friends for many, a way to feel at home for others. On weekends, fans of soccer — or fútbol, futebol, calcio, Fußball, chuggu, or sepak bola, as the sport is known the world over — gather to cheer on their favorite teams and players, filling icehouses and dingy bars with their palpable energy, their collective gasps, jeers and shouts of joy. And every four years, dedicated fans fill area bars in their country’s colors, ready to test their faith anew. It is thanks to these many fans, players and supporters from across the region that Houston has a vibrant soccer culture that makes the World Cup hosting duties all the richer.
That’s the power of a sport that can feel like a religion for many.
That intense draw is on beautiful display on the Gulfton playing fields where the reVision players practice, Rotramel said. Shortly after settling into apartments nearby, newly arrived families from Afghanistan began venturing out to the fields. Now, Rotramel said, kids as young as 5 come running just as soon as school lets out. “They see us every day playing soccer,” said Rotramel, “and they want to play, so they come over. They don’t speak English at all. They don’t speak the languages our kids speak but they know how to kick a ball and they know what soccer means.”
Similar stories abound across our diverse metropolitan region where roughly 1 in 4 residents — some 1.6 million in total — are born outside the country, according to the latest census numbers.
“I didn’t know how to spell my ABCs, but I knew how to play soccer” Sangho Yi told Houston Chronicle reporter Sam González Kelly. Yi’s family was cheering him on at one of the semi-regular Sunday games in Cullen Park where his Houston United Korean Soccer Team plays. “I made the team. Even though I couldn’t speak a word, we played soccer together and I made friends,” he said.
Then there’s Elsik High School, located in the hugely diverse Alief neighborhood. It fielded the topranked soccer team in the United States in 2018, and won that year’s Class 6A Texas state championship. As is increasingly common in the Houston area, many of the players were born outside the country. Soccer offers common ground. “They steal moves from each other,” Elsik coach Vincenzo Cox told Texas Monthly. “Fakes, feints, no-look passes — and then, the next thing you know, they’re perfecting them. They start to see the good in each other. They start connecting. And once I can get to that point, I can get them to run through a brick wall for each other.”
Houston has hosted the World Series, the NBA Finals, the NCAA Final Four and the Super Bowl. These six or so World Cup matches played in Houston will be something entirely new. The sport’s biggest tournament attracts so many diehard fans every four years that FIFA couldn’t even consider Houston for the semi-finals or finals. NRG stadium just isn’t big enough.
“It’s going to be something unlike anything we’ve ever seen here before and it’s going to bring great value and great benefits to our city,” Canetti promised.
Cheers to all that, but especially to the refugees, immigrants and diverse fans across Houston who have created a soccer culture we can all be proud of.
As Rotramel told us: “It’s not just about soccer — that’s the vehicle — but it’s really about the community.”