World Cup
live
Updated
There are four months until the 2026 World Cup kicks off across Canada, Mexico and the United States.
Despite more than 100 days separating us from the first kick on June 11, there is news worthy of reporting every and we will be bringing you all of that news and more in our coverage here.
Stay across all things 2026 World Cup here on The Athletic.
FIFA President Gianni Infantino has spoken out against banning Russia and Israel from international football — and also defended awarding U.S. President Donald Trump the FIFA Peace Prize in December.
Infantino was speaking in an hour-long, in-person interview with Yalda Hakim, host of The World on Sky News, which was released online on Monday afternoon.
“We have to,” Infantino responded when asked whether he is going to explore lifting the ban. “Definitely. Because this ban has not achieved anything, it has just created more frustration and hatred.”
On the possibility of changing FIFA’s statutes to stop national teams being banned, Infantino said they “should actually never ban any count.
In a wide-ranging interview, the FIFA president defended handing Trump the FIFA Peace Prize ahead of the men’s World Cup draw in Washington at the beginning of December.
“Whatever we can do to help peace in the world, we should be doing it, and for this reason, for some time we were thinking about (whether) we should do something to reward people who do something,” Infantino said of the award, before insisting that “objectively, he (Trump) deserves it”.
GO FURTHER
FIFA chief Gianni Infantino against Russia and Israel bans, defends Trump’s Peace Prize
FIFA is selling parking passes at 2026 World Cup games in Los Angeles for $250 or $300 per matchday and per spot — more than the price of some actual match tickets.
The passes are for parking spaces more than a mile away from SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, Calif., according to listings on FIFA’s “official World Cup 2026 parking website.”
SoFi will host eight World Cup matches, including the U.S. team’s opener and a quarterfinal. For those two matches, a single parking spot is priced at $300. For the other six, including Iran vs. New Zealand and the third U.S. group match, a pass costs $250. (A Category 3 ticket to some of those matches costs $140 or $180.)
A FIFA spokesperson, when asked to justify the prices, told The Athletic that “parking prices are determined based on local market conditions and benchmarking against comparable major events previously held in each host city.”
The $250 spots appear to be in or near the “VIP West Garage” at the Intuit Dome, the Los Angeles Clippers basketball arena, which is just outside SoFi Stadium’s Hollywood Park campus. FIFA’s parking website, which is operated by JustPark, estimates that the walk from parking spot to stadium would take 21 minutes, though the exact length would depend on security checkpoints, entrances and other factors.
GO FURTHER
World Cup parking for $300? FIFA selling spots at L.A. games for more than tickets
Hello, and welcome along to The Athletic!
There are still more than four months until the 2026 World Cup kicks off, but we are you bringing you all the latest updates as they happen right here right up until the first ball is kicked on June 11.
We will have everything from ticket information to the tournament's political links, so stick with us over the course of the week.