{"id":43342,"date":"2026-03-11T06:04:43","date_gmt":"2026-03-11T06:04:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=43342"},"modified":"2026-03-11T06:04:43","modified_gmt":"2026-03-11T06:04:43","slug":"infantino-says-trump-welcomes-irans-world-cup-participation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=43342","title":{"rendered":"Infantino says Trump welcomes Iran’s World Cup participation"},"content":{"rendered":"
FIFA President Gianni Infantino said on Wednesday that he met with United States President Donald Trump, who told him he welcomed Iran\u2019s participation in the \u200b2026 Soccer World Cup, which will be co-hosted by the US, Mexico \u200cand Canada.<\/p>\n

Iran was the only nation missing from a FIFA planning summit for World Cup participants held last week in Atlanta, deepening questions over whether the country’s soccer team will compete \u200bon US soil this summer amid an escalating regional war.<\/p>\n

The Reuters Iran Briefing newsletter keeps you informed with the latest developments and analysis of the Iran war.<\/p>\n

Trump told Politico \u200bearlier that he is not concerned about Iran’s participation, as they \u2060were a “very badly defeated country”.<\/p>\n

“We also spoke about the current situation in Iran, \u200band the fact that the Iranian team has qualified to participate in the FIFA \u200bWorld Cup 2026,” soccer’s world governing body, FIFA, boss Infantino said in a post on his official social media account.<\/p>\n

Read: Dangers for the US, Trump multiply a week into Iran war<\/p>\n

“During the discussions, President Trump reiterated that the Iranian team is, of \u200bcourse, welcome to compete in the tournament in the United States.<\/p>\n

“We all need \u200ban event like the FIFA World Cup to bring people together now more than ever, and \u200cI \u2060sincerely thank the President of the United States for his support, as it shows once again that Football Unites the World.”<\/p>\n

Iran secured a trip to a fourth successive World Cup by topping Group A in the third round of Asian qualifying \u200blast year, but Mehdi \u200bTaj, president of \u2060the Football Federation of the Islamic Republic of Iran, said the viciousness of the attacks by US and Israeli forces did \u200bnot augur well for the World Cup, to be held \u200bfrom June \u206011 to July 19.<\/p>\n

The Iranians were grouped with Belgium, Egypt and New Zealand in Group G. Their matches are scheduled to take place in the US, two in \u2060Los \u200bAngeles and one in Seattle.<\/p>\n

If both the US and \u200bIran finish second in their respective groups, the two countries could meet in a July 3 elimination \u200bmatch in Dallas.<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

FIFA President Gianni Infantino said on Wednesday that he met with United States President Donald Trump, who told him he welcomed Iran\u2019s participation in the \u200b2026 Soccer World Cup, which will be co-hosted by the US, Mexico \u200cand Canada. Iran was the only nation missing from a FIFA planning summit for World Cup participants held […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-43342","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-english-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43342","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=43342"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43342\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=43342"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=43342"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=43342"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}