2026 WC USA (et al): Worldwide Opponents Watch [all R's]

Tragic for Guate

 

Agreed. Except it would have been funny to watch them playing with World Cup Finals refereeing. Would have been down to 9 men at half.

 

I would be so happy for Haiti.

 

Suriname, Curaçao and Haiti…all three are live to qualify on the final day.

Fantastic.

 

It is fixable because FIBA (FIFA for basketball) fixed it. They just have a max of 1 naturalized player per team.

out of curiosity though, do you think these naturalized players (having lived in the nation for 5+ years) are more or less valid as players for said national team than someone with one grandparent from the nation they play for?

I do think FIFA should think deeply about how to tactfully put in some new rules, we have entire squads (look at Suriname or curaçao) of players who weren’t born or raised in the country — many of which have very weak ties.


Personally I’d do max 2 naturalized players and cut the grandparent thing, has to be a parent.

 

No Ndidi for Nigeria against DRC. He'll miss the playoff final due to yellow card accumulation. Heavy blow for the Super Eagles

🚨Ndidi forfait contre la RDC ! ❌🇳🇬

Wilfred Ndidi manquera la finale des barrages continentaux face à la RD Congo.

Le milieu des Super Eagles a écopé d’un second carton jaune hier face au Gabon, après un premier contre le Rwanda en phase de groupes.

Un coup dur pour le… pic.twitter.com/jv5rqE2Pnx

— Actu foot RD Congo 🇨🇩 (@ActuFootRDCongo) November 14, 2025

 

Petar Musa of FC Dallas scores for the World Cup clinching goal for Croatia!!

THE MOOSE IS LOOSE IN WORLD CUP QUALIFYING 🫎🫎🫎 pic.twitter.com/n8yewOnfzS

— FC Dallas (@FCDallas) November 14, 2025

 

Why?

This is an honest question, because I do not understand (as someone with a grandparent tie to his own chosen national side) what the issue is behind arguments like these.

Nationality isnt limited to borders. Some conceptions of nationality focus more on physical boundaries, but many national identities remain strong across those borders.

These nations you are citing with these heavy diasporas are the way they are because they have a long history of migration (or, in the case of Curacao, are still straight up colonial possessions). History, for whatever reason, spread them around more than many other people, but they maintain a national identity.

Why should FIFA, or any sport, bar the expression of that identity? The national team is supposed to represent nations. Nations with diasporas define their identities count too, no?

Moreover, why should wealthier, more powerful nations that draw huge numbers of people from everywhere else get the chance to expand their own national identities at the same time, to the detriment of everyone else? By your logic, these nations get to build their nationalities, dont have to worry about losing much because they are too wealthy to be exporters and are instead destinations, and get to basically cut off other nationalities after just a single generation. Why is that right?

What are "weak ties"? Can you determine ties are weak solely by referencing a grandparent? I thinks hundreds of millions of other migrants/descendants would disagree with that. I dont think the typical Surinamese or Curacaoan looks at their dual nationals the way you do. I know the average Jamaican does not (although there is a loud minority to the contrary). And if the people in these nations dont feel this way, where does the presumption youre making come from?

I agree there has to be a limit to all of this, and FIFA must think carefully on the topic. But I would also content that this is exactly what they've done.

Naturalization is a long, hard process that requires continuous residency.

The qualification by descent cuts off at grandparents, which is the maximum that exists within living memory for most people, and in line with how many diasporas define and maintain their own ties (grandparents are pretty important in this). They require hard proof of birth and ancestral ties that can take years to acquire for some countries. Its not that easy or cavalier.

So really, what is the issue? Who benefits from this proposed limitation?

Locally based players? OK, thats obvious.

Does the nation benefit? Not really, the limit contradicts their own national identity and kneecaps their ability to integrate their diaspora.

Does the game benefit? Not really, the football gets worse all around.

Do fans benefit? Not really, its worse football.

I guess the USA, UK, France and other big destinations win. OK, cool, but they are already winning. Do they need more?

 

CONCACAF qualifying without the "big three" (or big 2-1/2, or whatever) has definitely not gone the way that I think any of us have remotely expected, that's for sure.

Let me just say that this new WC format is stupid, and that 48 nations total is stupid, BUT....

I am very happy for those whose nations actually have a real chance at this point to make it to the tournament for the first time ever. That's the upside.

 

I've snipped the rest but would like to add some things. FIFA requires a Grandparent but also citizenship. Some countries allow having Grandparents who are citizens for eligibility by birth, some don't. FIFA requires 5 years residence for naturalisation; other countries have more or less. My country requires a parent to be Australian for birthright citizenship, or for a parent to have permanent residency if you are born in Australia. If your parent only has a temporary visa and you are born here you don't get citizenship unless you have lived here to age 10 when it is granted automatically. If born overseas you can get citizenship if one of your parents (not grandparents) is an Australian Citizen. If you immigrate to Australia you can get citizenship after 4 years residence (at least 1 of those years as a permanent resident) and haven't spent more than 12 months outside the country in that time or 3 months in the last year. We make it harder than FIFA do for expats but a little easier for immigrants with no previous connection to Australia than FIFA. I don't see FIFA's rules as a problem. There are always some countries that will try and stretch the rules but if you make them much tighter then it stops genuine immigrants from playing for their new nation.

 

Am I wrong in saying that despite being in CONCACAF, the United States has never played Suriname?

It seems to be the case.

Will there be a couple of blowouts at the World Cup due to the expanded field? Yes. Just like there has been at the U17 World Cup. But overall, the increased representation will be fun.

At the senior level, those blowouts seem hard to obtain without red cards. Suriname won't be pasted 9-0 by Croatia. [Croatia beat the Faroe Islands 3-1 yesterday. I don't know why I picked Croatia.]

Mexico has played Suriname three times since 2022. 3-0, 2-0, 2-0.

Canada played Suriname in the Nations League in 2024. The legs were 1-0 and 3-0.

So obviously, Suriname isn't up to that level. But they also wouldn't like to be pasted off the field by the majority of teams at the event. They might be by a Spain caliber team, but whatever..........so could the USMNT.

You look at Suriname's recent results prior to WCQing, and maybe their performance shouldn't seem as much of a shock as it has been. Playing Canada to a 1-0 game? At the 2025 Gold Cup they lost to Costa Rica 4-3. Also a 1-1 draw with Costa Rica in the Nations League. Drew with Haiti.

Maybe it shouldn't be a shock that they're competing so well with the Guatemala/El Salvador level teams in CONACAF.

They've been doing some things to get noticed. I certainly hadn't been paying attention.......................

 

False news. Ndidi is eligible to play after all

TEAM NEWS UPDATE 📰

CAF has confirmed that Wilfred Ndidi is eligible to feature for the Super Eagles in Sunday’s playoff clash against DR Congo.

Cautions accumulated during the World Cup qualifiers do not carry over into the playoffs; only confirmed suspensions apply. pic.twitter.com/hJNYMxdr64

— 🇳🇬 Super Eagles (@NGSuperEagles) November 15, 2025

 

Really?

It's only recently that they passed the law to obtain dual nationals. Idk if you remember, but prior to a couple of years ago, they were prohibited by law to obtain dual nationals. Then they passed a law that allowed them to have some sort of sporting visa so that they could suit up dual nationals on the NT unlike Curaçao.

This was a long time coming once that law was passed. They still haven't recruited the best players eligible that wouldn't make the cut for The Netherlands such as Doekhi, Piroe, Summerville, Dilrosun, etc.

 

Less Valid. Ancestry is Ancestry, that's #1, I think born in a country, is what it is, at least for the usa culturally, being born here matters, it confers citizenship, now moving somewhere for a better life is a part of our cultural history as well, but I don't think there's any evidence whatsoever that these UAE guys from South America, are going to retire in UAE, I'd bet nearly everything I've got that they don't and that makes it different from people coming to say the US, or Europe for a better life, and people going to a league for a better paycheck and hell, marketing via playing in a WC for them.



On another topic, look at Kazakstan. Currently up with an early goal, 1-0 on Belgium, unlucky to grab another later. It probably doesn't matter, as they have a game in hand and a 1 point lead over second place Northern Macedonia, and a 4 point lead on Wales (who also have 2 matches left) but wow. I'm just not sure what to think of Belgium. We all know that golden generation of '12-'22 is over, with some vets likely to play in WC '26, but most gonzo, but this is a real weird early half time result anyway (admittedly the Kazk's are tough on the road), but with a home and road draw in the books already vs Northern Macedonia, and now this kind of crummy through half time performance, not sure what to think of them.

 

I maintain that there won't be any worse quality teams in a 48 team world cup than there are in a 32 team one.

There will just be more of those same quality bottom teams. There will also be some good additions that would not have made a 32 team worldcup. Overall its positive IMO.

64 on the other hand is too much. The format will be better, but I think its just too many teams.

 

Some of these "extra" teams will bring a lot of fun in 2026
Scotland, Ireland, Hungary, Turkey, Iceland etc. still being alive from Europe for instance. Their fans will bring a lot of fun to the event.

The "extra" teams from most regions are still going to be really competitive.
Malta won't be coming. Although Malta actually won a World Cup qualifier yesterday.

Scores from yesterday. Minnows ain't minnows anymore.

Malta 1 Finland 0
Albania 1 Andorra 0
Italy 2 Moldova 0
Montenegro 2 Gibraltar 1
Croatia 3 Faroe Islands 1

I don't know why exactly that is. But there are very few of these scores from Europe that are 9-0 smashings. Like...................Gibraltar can field a competitive team. Gibraltar has the population of ~40k

There are 817 cities in the US with populations over 50k. Gibraltar fields a team that only loses 3-0 to Croatia in a WCQer. That's crazy to me. That's soccer in 2025.

 

I assume the lack of blowouts is because the smaller teams have become more efficient at low blocking tactics. They've realized this is the only way to take on much stronger teams, and it doesn't take much football talent , but sheer discipline to be able to successfully implement such strategies.

 

I like 48. It might be hypocritical, but the jump from 24 to 48 at the U17 level just struck me as idiotic. It's one thing to jump by 12, but 24, literally doubling the size? That's crazy, especially considering (and my main argument really pro the senior level increase) at the youth levels, confederation tickets are balanced already. The problem, for me anyway, with the senior WC, is the way it evolved, the tickets were always heavily weighted to Europe and to a lesser extent to South America, Europe simply because Europe best, South America because they were 2nd best, and also had geographically evolved to have a much smaller ratio of geographic space to country borders (in South America the countries are generally different scales of enormous, in Europe it's the opposite other than Spain and France).

I've wanted to see CAF get their fair share considering the size and sheer quantity of countries in the region, and if that meant over-indulging the corrupt AFC and Concacrap, so be it, it would still make it more of a WC than the 32 team set up that gifted UEFA 12.5-14 slots per WC (basically 39-43% of slots which is not a WC, it's a Euro Championship+Copa America, plus pity slots for the rest of the world), so I'm happy with 48.

With regards to Concacrap, this sort of underlines that I've half won the argument (ego massaging here) which some members of the forum pushed back in '17-'22 that Concacrap was improving a great deal (maybe due to MLS/USL/whatever), when I argued that it wasn't as evidence of how much worse the big boys were getting:

El Tri in decline
Costa Rica Golden Generation Retiring/in decline
Honduras in decline (though I always didn't trust that as I felt Honduras simply had a bad Ocho, the fact that they were 3rd place in NL '21, suggested to me that they just imploded for a year, rather than were in decline)
Jamaica static
T&T in decline
Guatemala continuing to decline

Essentially every one of the traditional hex teams cycle to cycle was worse other than us.

The only exceptions seemed to be:
Us: We either had a golden generation, or were clearly improving (I think it's a bit of both)
Canada: The same (I think its a bit of both)
Panama: Who clearly radically improved the program over the past 20 years, going from a baseball nation that sucked at soccer, to a consistent top 3-5 Concacrap nation by '13)

I think I'm right. But I will say there have been other interesting developments, maybe others have the inside knowledge: all the improvement we've seen lately has come from 2nd and 3rd tier Caribbean sides (Haiti, Curacao, Dominican Republic and South American Suriname), Central America just seems in decline in general and/or waiting for another golden generation. Other than Panama, I have not seen any golden generation reboots of the sorts that Costa Rica and Honduras had in the nineties, and fifteen years ago. It's only Panama, but I think Honduras might be getting back a bit (until the other night anyway), but there's not enough evidence to suggest anything beyond they aren't horrible, for now anyway.

I got my fingers crossed that a Haitian miracle can happen, and if all 3 happen or even 2 of the 3, it would be incredible.

 

Oh I'm sure there will be. as a random example, there were 6 4+ goal wins at the U17 WC in '23, and 13 this past month. More crappy teams equals more beat downs. I also don't care though. This has never been a true WC, it's always been a Euros+Copa América (generally speaking Europe+ South America typically controlled a touch under 60% of the slots, Europe always controls 37-43% of slots, and considering the quantity of countries, and population size of the various countries of AFC, CAF, Oceania and Concacrap, that's always been ridiculous, even with me acknowledging that UEFA has more than earned it with its performance, and Brazil and Argentina and little Uruguay combined being nearly as powerful as all of Europe (10 WC Titles to 12), again, it's been earned, but it's still not a WC, when CAF essentially gets 15% of the slots. Its absurd. Same with AFC getting only 12.5% to 14%.

It had to change, just to make this a true world affair, and UEFA and Conmebol were never gonna say, "Okay, here's 5 of our slots, and 1 Conmebol slot". So if it had to be increased, so be it, I want it to be a world affair and now it actually is one.

 

Indeed. They're just better, stronger, more disciplined, etc. than before. More professional.

And the same is true for a lot of the smaller CONCACAF nations.

Kazakhstan is drawing Belgium 1-1 right now late in the 2nd half.
[I do think that I probably underestimate teams from that region of the world. Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, etc.]

And, of course, everyone is recruiting dual nationals these days.

I was looking at Maltas roster yesterday that beat Finland.
They have Jamie Carragher's son on their roster. He's not something special. He's on loan at Inverness. Still, everyone is making these kinds of additions if they can.

I understand why people are criticizing the UAE.

But hell, I've seen people's opinions about the USMNT doing everything they can to recruit dual nationals if we can. If we were able to expedite our eligible dual-nationals or green card holders, this board would be in favor of it.

 

I think the country made a change in its citizenship laws a decade or so ago allowing for dual citizenship with Holland which previously hadn't been allowed, prior to that Suriname was limited to homegrown talent which meant they were basically minnows (and of course many great Dutch players in years past had Surinamese roots or were even born and raised there, but in the latter case they had been born as Dutch citizens prior to full independence in the mid 70s). I probably have some of the details wrong but it's something like that.

Since the law changed they've been using more dual citizens and increased their talent pool significantly, and now compete in the Gold Cup, latter stages of WCQ/NL, etc--we just haven't happened to run into them yet but it's only a matter of time.

 

Yep: Kazak's have 3 draws, 1 win and no losses at home. They are a tough home team. They've never been potentially there like the Uzbek's (who if memory serves, have consistently finished a playoff loser, or one spot out of a playoff spot in AFC for like 3 or 4 cycles in a row before qualifying. Kazak's aren't that, but they pretty consistently get results in half or half plus 1 of their home matches in qualifying (and often grab a result away against the other crummy side in their group). I checked the Uzbek history and they were in the regional playoff and lost on penalties in '14, missed the playoff by GD in '18, and then finished in 2nd in the semifinal round in '22 behind Saudi, so yeah, they've been close close close, and then finally got it done after they increased the size this cycle. I took a look at the Tajik's, and they were god awful '10, '14, and '18, but did better in '22 (2nd in the semifinal round, not advancing), and in '26 they were went 2-2-2 and were knocked out (did draw qualifiers Saudi Arabia and Jordan at home, and beat the 4th place team, but still finished behind the 2 qualifiers).

Was sad for Pukki to finish his career with Finland dropping a fart in church performance against Malta at home. What a bummer. They had a nice little moment at the Euro's in '20/'21, and still looked good in Euro '24 qualifying, but man, what a face plant yesterday and with everything on the line.

 

Luxembourg 0 - 2 Germany as well. and believe it or not, Luxembourg had a couple of chances. Germany has not been looking especially unbeatable at all.

 

Belgium only need a point at home to Liechtenstein to qualify and should do the job. Even a loss still gives them a good chance on goal difference. Macedonia and Wales are playing for a seeding spot in the playoffs as both are through to at least that with whoever comes 3rd being a nations league group winner in a high enough spot.

 

I like 48 but don't like the format...not a fan of letting 3rd place teams advance. Better to go back to top 2 but with the top 8 group winners getting a bye in the 1st knockout round (which would also have the added benefit of giving the teams with 6 points thru 2 games something to play for in the 3rd match)