There is a new rule for The World Cup. FIFA has approved the new format of the biggest football competition in the world. There will be 48 teams in the tournament in 2026! As you remember, the first World Cup, which was held in 1930, was with 13 teams. Since then, the number of the nations to take part in the final tournament has increased to 32 in 1998.
Since 2026 there will be 48 teams, separated into 16 groups, as there will be 3 teams in each of the groups. The best two teams of each group will find a place in the knockout stage of the competition (1/32 finals). However, the teams which will reach the final match will take part in 7 matches, which remains the same as in the previous editions of the tournament. The World Cup is going to last 32 days, which again remains unchanged. That means that the total number of the matches will increase from 64 to 80.
The FIFA’s council Gianni Infantino has also thought about a penalty shootout after each of the games, no matter it is from the group or the knockout stage.
There have been a lot of discussions about whether these changes will make the tournament even more interesting, or it will reduce the class of the participants – as there will be teams, which have never qualified for the tournament before.
According to the unconfirmed information, 3 more teams from Europe will find a place in the final tournament (from 13 to 16), while there will be 9 places each for Asia and Africa. However, FIFA will decide this by May.
In conclusion, the more teams in the competition the more money for FIFA. This expansion of The World Cup will have also a positive outcome over the popularity of the game all around the world. For sure, it will be a very interesting World Cup!
