ARLINGTON and HOUSTON – FIFA announced the 2026 World Cup host cities on Thursday afternoon. Both Texas cities still in the running Dallas and Houston secured host city status for the world’s biggest sporting event.
Both cities will host at their National Football League stadiums, with Dallas hosting at AT&T Stadium and Houston hosting at NRG Stadium. Dallas will be hosting the tournament for the second time after the Cotton Bowl hosted up to the quarter-final stages in 1994.
While that leaves Austin, El Paso and San Antonio out of hosting, which none of them ever had a shot at anyway. But it doesn’t leave those cities out of the World Cup altogether. With 48 teams competing in 2026, there will be plenty of opportunities to participate in the World Cup.
The most significant way these cities can be involved is by hosting a training camp facility for one of the 48 teams. This is especially true of Austin and San Antonio, with three host cities close to the I-35 pair with the addition of Monterrey in Nuevo Leon.
Both cities have quality training facilities thanks to the football clubs in those two cities. Both hold stadiums for potential friendly matches or for training to be attended by fans and media as needed.
Austin is 203 miles from AT&T Stadium (roughly 3:30 drive on a Friday afternoon), 166 miles from NRG Stadium (3 hours) and 379 miles away from Estadio BBVA (a long drive, thanks to the border crossing). San Antonio is 300 miles from Monterrey, 201 from Houston and 282 miles from Dallas.
Of course, these teams won’t drive anyway, so their travel times will be shorter. The longest flight from each city would be to Monterrey. That’s just over an hour from San Antonio and 90 minutes from Austin. Unlike most fans, the teams might find it even quicker, flying private.
While it’s not the same as hosting actual games, hosting a team is a big thing, and these cities should make a serious run at it. Each town could then adopt the relevant team staying in their city to add some interest to the non-USA or Mexico (editor note: or Australia) games in the tournament.
Hosting a team can lead to long relationships between cities, or improve existing ones, as was the case for Japan and Gosford during the 2003 Rugby World Cup. That could lead to Austin hosting its sister countries. Australia (sister city, Adelaide was founded in 1836, the same year as Texas), France (Angers), Turkey (Antalya), South Korea (Gwangmyeong), England (Hackney), Germany (Koblenz), Peru (Lima), Japan (Oita), Nigeria (Orlu) or China (Xishuangbanna). San Antonio has relationships with Spain (Las Palmas and Tenerife), South Korea (Gwangju), Japan (Kumamoto), China (Wuxi), Germany (Darmstadt) and Spain (Mogeur, home of the founding father, Antonio de Olivares).
Cities around Texas could also host FIFA fan venues, allowing for a communal watch party. This is something that groups are bound to do in all cities anyway but getting that FIFA tag could take it to another level.
Cities should go for it and be part of the world’s biggest sporting event, even if it’s not for a match itself.
Featured Photo: Houston 2026
Texas Soccer News 