FIFA’s World Cup chief operating officer says the tournament is “too big” to be postponed due to global turmoil brought on by the U.S. and Israeli struggle in opposition to Iran.
Speaking on Monday (March 9, 2026) on the International Broadcast Center for the 48-nation tournament, which begins June 11, Heimo Schirgi stated FIFA continues to carefully monitor the Iran struggle and its fallout.
“If had a crystal ball I could tell you now what is going to happen, but obviously the situation is developing,” Schirgi stated.
“It’s changing day by day and we are monitoring closely. We’re working together with all our federal partners and also our international partners in evaluating the situation, and we basically take it day by day and at some stage we will have a resolution. And the World Cup will go on obviously, right? The World Cup is too big and we hope that everyone can participate that has qualified.”
The tournament, expanded from 32 nations to 48, is scheduled for 11 U.S. venues plus three in Mexico and two in Canada. While the Trump administration has imposed a journey ban on 4 of the nations which have certified — Iran, Ivory Coast, Haiti and Senegal — it says it’ll make an exception for gamers, staff officers and instant kin.
Schirgi stated FIFA is in fixed contact with Iran’s soccer federation for updates, however he would not share any particulars about these conversations.
FIFA officers have been in Dallas for the announcement of plans for the town’s fan competition that may function for 34 days through the World Cup and to view development of the published hub on the downtown conference centre — about 20 miles (32 kilometers) from AT&T Stadium, the house of the NFL’s Dallas Cowboys the place 9 matches will be performed.
“Given the state of the world today, this will be a great opportunity to bring everyone together,” Schirgi stated.
“For you who have not experienced the World Cup, the World Cup is very special because it’s truly global and it brings everybody together. We witnessed that in Qatar, in Russia, everywhere. People were amazed how international this whole thing is.”
Schirgi additionally addressed FIFA’s shock determination final month to add a 48-hour window for ticket gross sales. FIFA has been criticized for ticket costs as excessive as $8,680 for class one seats — the perfect within the decrease bowls — $5,575 for class two and $4,185 for class three. Tickets for the primary spherical vary as excessive as $2,735 for class one, $1,940 for class two and $1,120 for class three.
“It was basically giving an opportunity to fans who have applied and were not successful for tickets in their category to offer them a different category of tickets,” Schirgi stated.
“So if you have applied for a category three ticket for a specific match and you haven’t got it because we don’t have enough category three tickets, we offered those people because they applied early — we said instead of having a category three ticket, would you like a category two ticket?”
After criticism, FIFA stated in December it was promoting a couple of hundred $60 tickets for each sport to the 48 nationwide federations within the tournament, to be bought to their repeatedly attending followers.
