North America's Return World Cup Arrives Amid Record Costs and Mounting Controversies

The 2026 FIFA World Cup opens in North America this month, marking the region's first hosting of the tournament in 32 years and bringing with it a price tag that has set a new benchmark for the cost of staging global sport. The event was always going to invite scrutiny; what organisers may not have anticipated was quite how much of it would arrive before a ball was kicked.

The tournament — spread across the United States, Canada and Mexico — is widely described as the most expensive in World Cup history. The expanded 48-team format, larger number of venues and infrastructure commitments across three nations have driven spending to levels that make previous editions look modest by comparison.

The chaos framing has drawn comparisons to the 1994 edition, also held in the United States, when the O.J. Simpson police chase unfolded during the tournament and threatened to consume media attention entirely. Three decades later, organisers find themselves navigating a fresh set of distractions that have cast a shadow over preparations.

The precise nature of the current controversies was characterised across reporting as wide-ranging, touching on logistics, governance and the broader politics of international sport. The scale of the host footprint — dozens of cities across a continent — has added operational complexity that critics argue was underestimated at the bidding stage.

Supporters of the tournament have pointed to the historic opportunity of uniting three nations under one event and the commercial potential of the North American market, the largest untapped audience for soccer's global showcase. Sceptics, meanwhile, have questioned whether the ambition of the expanded format serves the sport or primarily the financial interests of FIFA and its commercial partners.

Soccer's foothold in the United States has grown considerably since 1994, when the country hosted a World Cup without a top-flight professional league. Major League Soccer now operates across dozens of clubs, and the national team has rebuilt its standing following its failure to qualify for the 2018 edition. The 2026 tournament is widely seen as a pivotal moment for the sport's long-term trajectory in North America.

What remains unclear is how significantly the pre-tournament turbulence will affect either the spectacle on the pitch or public enthusiasm in the host nations. Previous World Cups have demonstrated the tournament's capacity to generate its own momentum once competition begins, absorbing off-field noise as the sport takes over.

Whether the 2026 edition can replicate that pattern — and deliver on its extraordinary cost — will become clearer as the group stage unfolds. For now, the tournament arrives carrying both the weight of expectation and an unusually heavy load of unresolved questions.