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In case you’ve been living under a rock, the first phase of World Cup ticket sales for the general public begins this month (next week!)!

FIFA’s first announcements were quite vague but FIFA finally released additional details. Starting September 10th and through the 19th, VISA card holders can submit their request to purchase tickets. Read more here if you need to but wishing you all the best of luck!

And if you’re confused on how you can purchase tickets without knowing the matchups yet; well, you essentially purchase tickets to attend a match in a city on a specific date, regardless of who plays.

The big question though…what will the pricing levels be and how will the dynamic pricing come into play? With FIFA’s use of Ticketmaster at the 2025 Club World Cup and the ticket job applications from FIFA mentioning Ticketmaster, all of us fans are understandably concerned.

This is actually a topic submitted via “Reader Questions” but it was such a good question, it deserves it’s own heading in the newsletter.

The gist of the question was “When can members of host nations MEX / CAN / USA submit their ticket request allocations?”

First, let’s catch everyone up. FIFA (typically) allocates a small % of match tickets for each match to the qualifying federations. I believe it is (typically) around 7-8% and each federation is in charge of distribution to its fans. We mentioned CanadaRED in last newsletter as an example but if you are cheering on a specific team in 2026 and want tickets to their matches, you may want to check your federation’s page.

Regarding timing - I haven’t seen any specific information yet and put out an inquiry; however, if we use Qatar 2022 as an example,

From this timeline example one could surmise that shortly after the World Cup Draw, the federations will commence their process. Note: you still need a FIFA ID to secure the tickets.

If you’re interested in Volunteering for 2026, get your <censored> together and submit your application!

The process closes on September 15th and there’s reportedly well over 500K applications for just 65K positions. There was also some noise about FIFA making billions from this tournament and using free work. That’s a fair point, especially because cities take on a lot of costs and little revenue but honestly, it can’t be a surprise. And if you reflect on the treatment of actual workers in 2022, it pales in comparison. Still, volunteering isn’t anything new....

Also saw this quote from a Brazil 2014 article, that is 100% truth “I think if FIFA needed people to clean the toilets at the World Cup, they would get volunteers for that because people are too crazy for football,”

I polished some recent skill acquisitions in website design while also launching a new Host City Guide section of the core website.

The purpose of this is to pull in links, research, etc to provide a solid starting ground for all things relevant to each city. It’s a work in progress and honestly, if you’re local or have experience for a certain location, send a message with your insight!

I’m not quite done with this section (perfectionism hindrance) but getting through these and should be done with the first go shortly.

The entire world (including our last newsletter) was reporting that the World Cup Draw was going to take place on December 5th and in Las Vegas. Well, we’re headed to the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. instead! And it truly was a last minute switch.

When reflecting back on this “switcharoo”, it is worth noting FIFA never released an official announcement. That isn’t fully unusual as news is often leaked and we try our best to call it a rumor without official news but it felt like a foregone conclusion. If you are wondering how that can happen across so many actual media companies, The Athletic’s Adam Crafton released details on how late of a change this really was by FIFA.

Per his article, US Soccer reportedly made plans to host a conference in Las Vegas and sending “Save the Dates”. Nevertheless, the world’s biggest sporting event will have it’s highly anticipated draw on December 5th still but in Washington, D.C.

World Cup qualifying resumes this September international window. While it feels there’s still so far to go, it is also crazy to reflect that in only 2.5 months, qualifying will virtually be over. In fact, South America will finish this window. Come November, the only rounds left will be the UEFA 2nd place playoff rounds + Intercontinental Playoffs.

Take a look at the summary below for World Cup qualifying. Each region is a clickable link to its standings and results.

As World Cup 2026 nears, we are receiving an uptick in messages from fans (keep’em coming - truly love each person’s story and questions!) as well as sponsor/collaboration interests.

If you’re interested in discussing an option that is mutually beneficial to everyone that reads this, send us a message. Please note, we respectively turn down more ideas than we accept due to strict adherence to our mission of only providing value to those interested World Cups and complementary matches. But, it’s great to network and meet people as there could be other opportunities for our other projects or others in our network.

So if you scanned past the top and wonder why Roadtrips as a title sponsor…Basically, if you want someone who knows the ins & outs of a World Cup, can provide access to blacked out hotels and gets the intricate details right for this massive, life-long dream event, it's worth at least an inquiry. Mention code WCG26 or The World Cup Guide if you do reach out.

Interested in sending a question? Hit respond directly from your inbox to send a message to submit a question. I’m summarizing & generalizing the topics here:

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Always showing love to our OG’s with shouts to AI Language Tutor Languatalk and virtual personal card Businesscards.io!