How the World Cup will be different next time
Conn Carroll
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Argentina and France will face off at 10 a.m. EST Sunday in the championship game of the 2022 World Cup. In one way, the conclusion of this year’s tournament will be the end of an era.
This will be the last World Cup to feature 32 teams, broken down into eight groups of four, with each team playing the other teams in their groups once before the top two teams from each group move on.
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The World Cup was not always structured this way, although it has served the event well for almost 30 years. Before the current format, the World Cup only included 24 teams, divided into six groups of four, with the top two teams advancing from each group, plus four third-place teams.
The last time the World Cup used the 24-team format was in 1994, and host country the United States barely advanced as one of that year’s third-place finishers (it then lost to Brazil in Palo Alto, California, on Independence Day 1-0).
The 2026 World Cup will also take place in the United States, with games occurring in the Mexican cities of Guadalajara, Mexico City, and Monterrey and the Canadian cities of Toronto and Vancouver as well. The 2026 World Cup will not be the first time multiple countries have hosted. In 2002, Japan and South Korea also shared hosting duties.
The 2026 World Cup will be the first time that the field of teams is expanding from 32 to 48. Instead of groups of four, the teams will be broken up into groups of three. Each team will play the other two teams in their group, and then the top two teams in each group will move on to a 32-team knockout tournament.
I’m not normally a huge fan of changing the structure of existing sports institutions, but I think this new format is actually an improvement. There will be more teams in tournament, which means even more fan interest worldwide, more games overall, and let’s be honest, sometimes that last group stage game can be a dud, especially if one team has already clinched a spot in the next round and is resting its starters.
With only two group stage games determining who goes on, every group stage game will be a can’t-lose situation. It should make for great soccer.
Oh, and the tournament will also be played in the summer as it always has been before the corrupt Qatari government moved this year’s tournament to December.
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