It won’t be long before Canada finds out its first opponent at the 2026 FIFA World Cup.
Scheduled to kick off June 12 at BMO Field in Toronto, the Canadian men’s national team knows it’ll play a team from Europe.
Most assume it’ll be Italy, for obvious reasons, but the four-time men’s World Cup champions need to win two more matches in order to qualify.
Remarkably, Italy is facing the possibility of failing to qualify for a third straight FIFA World Cup. Prior to missing out on the 2018 and 2022 World Cups, Italy had competed at every World Cup since 1958. They did win Euro 2020, however.
The Italians are in this predicament because Norway beat them twice last year in UEFA qualifying.
There are four countries competing in “Path A” of UEFA second-round qualifying, which kicks off this month. The country that makes it through will play in Canada’s group at the FIFA World Cup, along with Switzerland and Qatar.
The group stage will consist of 48 countries (FIFA)
The 13th-ranked Italians play Northern Ireland in Bergamo, Italy at 3:45 p.m. EDT/12:45 p.m. PDT on March 26. They’ll face the winners of Wales vs. Bosnia and Herzegovina, which kicks off at the same time in Cardiff, Wales.
We’ll find out who Canada faces on March 31, following a winner-take-all match that will be played in either Northern Ireland or Bosnia.
Four more European countries will qualify (FIFA)
While a match with Italy would raise the profile of Canada’s opening match by a lot, it would also decrease our country’s odds of advancing in the tournament. FIFA currently ranks Canada (29th) higher than Wales (35th), Northern Ireland (69th), and Bosnia and Herzegovina (71st).