FIFA reconsidering format for 2026 World Cup
Having just delivered the most exciting group stage ever seen at a World Cup, with a tried and tested format that keeps hundreds of millions of fans enthralled, FIFA now faces the prospect of ripping it all up.
Instead, it risks a turgid fortnight of drab games and dead rubbers, plus the possibility of unwanted controversy, as it tries to accommodate 48 teams at the 2026 edition in North America.
It means world soccer's governing body is rethinking the format for the next World Cup as its original plan to have 16 groups of three teams in the first phase, with two from each advancing to the next stage, now looks dangerously dull, as well as potentially courting unsporting behaviour.
As things stand now for 2026, when Canada, Mexico and the U.S. jointly host the World Cup, there is a risk of many “dead” matches.
FIFA conceded earlier this year it was concerned about the possibility of contrived results where two teams could engineer a positive result for both, which would eliminate the third group team not playing.
The 2026 format has the 48 teams reduced to 32 after the group phase and then the tournament becomes a knockout affair.
Alternative formats are now on the table, with the FIFA Council to decide next year.
They are, according to FIFA's head of global football development Arsene Wenger, 12 groups of four teams, with the best thirdplaced teams advancing with the top two, or another option to split the World Cup into two separate halves of 24, each featuring six groups of four teams. The winner of each half would meet in the final. Given how dramatic and exciting some of the four-team groups were concluded in Qatar, that seems a more viable proposition.
But that will mean a substantive increase in the number of games. The 32-team World Cup in Qatar has a total of 64, completed in 29 days, and, for now, the 2026 finals will be 80 games over 32 days.
With four team groups, there would be 104 matches, requiring at least an extra week.
More matches, however, would mean more television rights money and as the World Cup brings in some 90 per cent of FIFA's revenue, its leaders will be tempted.