If France will have to wait for this fall to launch its qualifying campaign for the 2026 World Cup, some nations have already validated their ticket for the United States, Mexico and Canada, which will host the World Cup next summer.
In addition to the three organizing countries, Argentina, in the AMSUD area, New Zealand, in the Oceania area, as well as Japan and Iran in the Asia area have won their qualification. However, Iran is not yet guaranteed to be traveling to America. The fault of Donald Trump.
On all the fronts since his return to the White House in late January, the American president ordered the implementation of measures to limit immigration from forty-three countries. And if all the states concerned are not housed in the same brand, Iran appears on the red list, its citizens being purely and simply prohibited from stay in the country of Uncle Sam.
FIFA remains confident but …
And the problem could also concern Venezuela, also placed on the Red List while its current selection of the AMSUD zone qualifiers is in a barragist position and therefore likely to compete in the World Cup play-off tournament which will be played … in the United States in March 2026.
The problem is a source of nightmares for FIFA leaders, in the forefront of which its president Gianni Infantino, who hopes to soften the position of Donald Trump. The Swiss was also received in the Oval Office in early March, and wanted to be confident about the issue. “It is important that everyone who will come and feel safe and welcome. We expect 10 million supporters in the stands, it is the equivalent of three super bowls every day ”he had blown.
In 2018, during the World Cup in Russia, the local authorities had suspended the entry restrictions on its territory, delivering an automatic visa to all the holders of a ticket.
“I think there is a room for maneuver, with economic consideration and visibility that Trump cannot deny, it is the main interest of a World Cup for a head of state. A successful and grandiose competition can serve the United Statessaid on this subject, Seghir Lazri, sports sociologist, in the columns of the point, adding: “The two countries in question are targets of his policy, it is blessed bread for him. Often the renunciation of a participation emanates from the countries themselves, as in Los Angeles and Moscow during the Olympic Games in the 1980s. Here, the question is quite different, with an ideological battle in progress. FIFA can also alleviate these rivalries, but if these selections and their supporters are allowed to come, how will Trump react? No one can predict it. ”
