Welcome to our new weekly World Cup edition! We are back, like baseball and light jacket weather. There is a lot happening around this summer’s tournament and we’ll be with you every Wednesday for the next 11 weeks as we follow the journeys of the teams still attempting to qualify for the final six spots (more on some of them below), look at the latest from the host cities prepping for kickoff, and dive deeper into the joy the World Cup can bring in these dark times. We’ll be discussing some of the favorites to win, the national teams making their maiden voyage in the tournament, and the players who are set to be the main characters throughout the summer, along with plenty of weird and wonderful in between.

As always, please email us at [email protected] with all of your thoughts, questions or opinions on any and all national team kits. We read every single message and will even respond to a few in this newsletter as spring marches toward summer. And if you need a reminder, here’s every country that’s qualified for the tournament so far. 🏆

ii. Besides what we’re covering in the newsletter this week, we’ve also got a ton of World Cup programming happening over on YouTube – starting TODAY with Rog, Rory Smith, and James Horncastle previewing tomorrow’s playoffs and UEFA qualifiers. Watch that in all its glory here. 

Then tomorrow, Rog will be joined by Icelandic dentist and Republic of Ireland manager, Heimir Hallgrímsson, an old friend returning to the show since he first appeared as Icelandic manager ahead of the incredible 2016 EUROs run in which he beat England. Re-live Rog's first encounter and fascinating deep-dive into Icelandic football. 🇮🇸🇮🇪

iii. Also happening this week: On Friday night, March 27, we will be live in ATLANTA with local legend Big Boi of OutKast, the one and only Clint Dempsey, and more. This will be a cultural crossover and World Cup celebration that is sure to be nothing short of magical. Grab your tickets here. 🍑

iv. Then next month, we head to TAMPA BAY on April 17 for Men in Blazers Live from Tampa Bay, presented by Verizon. Joined by a cast of luminous guests, we'll revel in the magic of the Premier League, shoulder to shoulder with this city’s vibrant footballing faithful. Join us in Tampa. 🏝️

v. Not a ton of wow-level goals yet this week, but this stunning, bending free-kick from 18-year-old Ronan Sullivan, brother of USMNT and Man City prospect, Cavan, for the Bangladesh U20 national team, is genuinely world-class. 🚀

vi. Lastly, one of the biggest stars at this summer’s upcoming World Cup, Egyptian king Mohamed Salah, announced yesterday that he’s leaving Liverpool at the end of the season. Listen to John Oliver’s beautiful words about what makes Mo such a unique force in football and life. ❤️

Cheers,
Jacob Schneider & Max Bonem

P.S. - Ten more nations dropped their World Cup away shirts yesterday and they are just excellent. 🤩

While we’ll focus on this week’s UEFA World Cup qualifiers tomorrow, today it’s intercontinental playoff time. A ticket to the World Cup is on the line for two nations as a result of the tournament’s expansion from 32 to 48 teams, with a six-team playoff tournament featuring each of the six confederations, except for UEFA.

The two highest-ranked teams by FIFA (Iraq and Congo DR) are deemed “seeded” and have semifinal byes, while the four lower-ranked nations are “unseeded” and must play a semifinal before clinching a berth in the final to play for a World Cup spot this summer. Now, to the matchups:

Playoff A: Bolivia 🇧🇴 vs. Suriname 🇸🇷 (Thursday, 6 p.m. ET, Peacock/FS1)

CONMEBOL’s lone representative in the playoffs, Bolivia, are competing here due to a sporting miracle. La Verde defeated Brazil on the final day of World Cup qualifying, 1-0, to secure seventh place in the standings and book their spot in the playoffs. Suriname, meanwhile, took second in their CONCACAF qualifying group, falling just short of clinching automatically. Led by Bundesliga journeyman Sheraldo Becker, A Natio are dreaming of a World Cup debut. The winner will play Iraq next Tuesday, March 31, in the final.

More: Speaking of Iraq, after initially requesting to postpone their final qualifier due to closed air space and endless visa issues, the Iraq national team has arrived in Mexico via Jordan after beginning their trip from Baghdad 11 days ago. Read more about that wild journey here.

Playoff B: New Caledonia 🇳🇨 vs. Jamaica 🇯🇲 (Thursday, 11 p.m. ET, Peacock/FS1)

The Reggae Boyz are looking to return to the World Cup for the first time since 1998 after ending as runners-up in their CONCACAF group during qualifying. A scoreless final match against Curacao saw them fall just short of an automatic berth, and as a result, manager Steve McClaren resigned, and new interim manager Rudolph Speid will look to, ahem, “stir it up” in the playoffs. 150th-ranked New Caledonia, however, are the biggest underdog story of the bunch. Nicknamed the Kagus, after the flightless, endangered bird found only in their forests, they’ll look to soar in the playoffs while taking their tiny, French-speaking island nation of 300,000 people to new heights. The winner here will play Congo DR in the final, also on March 31. Much more on the incredible New Caledonia story below.

Also: Check out Jamaica’s Bob Marley-themed kits in collaboration with his record label, Tuff Gong.

USMNT’s Final Roster Takes Shape 🇺🇲

Mauricio Pochettino's 18-month USMNT journey has been a rollercoaster of emotions to say the least, but with this week’s friendlies against Belgium and a Ronaldo-less Portugal, his World Cup squad is starting to reach its final form. Amongst the 27 players in Atlanta are all the big names from the past year—minus Tyler Adams, Sergiño Dest, Haji Wright and Diego Luna as they each work their way back to fitness—along with young guns like Ricardo Pepi, Alex Freeman, and Max Arfsten. One other player of note in camp is Gio Reyna, who’s played just 26 minutes this season for middling Bundesliga side Borussia Mönchengladbach, but came alive under Poch in the November friendlies. We’ll get a first look at the final camp squad when they face Kevin de Bruyne’s Belgium side on Saturday at 3 p.m. ET on TNT/HBO Max/Peacock.

More: Is the USMNT’s striker group the best it's ever had for a World Cup?

Increased Security Funding Is a Go 💰

After more than nine months of delays, 11 U.S. host cities have officially received $625 million of security funding from FEMA. While the increase was originally introduced in a bill by President Trump last summer (the so-called “One, Big, Beautiful Bill”), it was delayed after the partial shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security, which FEMA falls under. As a result, the 11 cities now have the much-needed funds, “to pay for increased police and emergency response at FIFA venues, hotels, and transportation hubs.”

In somewhat similar news, the town of Foxborough, Mass. recently granted FIFA the necessary license to hold World Cup matches at Gillette Stadium after previously demanding a guarantee that it would not be responsible for the required $7.8 million security bill. Instead, the local World Cup hosting committee, Boston 26, will pay the bill upfront with backing from Patriots and Gillette Stadium owner, Robert Kraft.

More: New bill would bar ICE raids near World Cup matches in US host cities.

Iran Will Participate in the World Cup as Planned, for Now 🇮🇷

After attempting to move their games from the U.S. to Mexico, it looks like the Iranian national team will still play their three group matches stateside as originally planned after FIFA rejected their request. The Iranian team has gone through a lot of challenges since the U.S. and Israel began their attacks on the country at the end of February, most recently with President Trump stating it would not be "appropriate" for Iran to play at the tournament "for their life and safety,” while the president of Iran’s football federation said they would “boycott the United States, but not the World Cup.” Much more on this evolving story here.

Also: U.S.-Israel war on Iran: How football in the region is struggling to deal with the fallout.

As we mentioned above, there’s a lot to love about the Kagus, so let’s dive a little deeper into the neutral’s favorite for this week’s intercontinental playoffs. The lowest-ranked of the six remaining teams, New Caledonia hails from an archipelago in the South Pacific, just northwest of New Zealand; a French territory, a long, long way from Guadalajara, Mexico, where they’ll face off against Jamaica.

Established as a FIFA member in just 2004, their roster mostly consists of domestic players from their 10-team Super Ligue, along with a few competing in no higher than the fifth tier of French football. In total, they have just one player on their roster competing at a top-flight level in Europe – Jekob Jeno, who plays for Unirea Slobozia in Romania’s Liga I. Their coach, Johann Sidaner, believes that they have “less than a one-percent chance” of qualifying, but said that with internal belief, anything can happen. To the mighty Kagus, courage!

More: Seventh-tier players, a new app and togetherness – Inside New Caledonia’s unlikely World Cup tilt.

Joël Piroe is one of multiple dual-nationals opting to switch allegiances this FIFA window, with the Leeds forward declaring his international football future to Suriname, rather than the Netherlands, where he was born and developed as part of PSV Eindhoven’s academy. As a result, A Natio have gained a clinical forward who could ultimately be the difference for them in this week’s playoffs.

The 26-year-old scored 19 goals and bagged seven assists for the Whites during their 2024/25 season in the Championship, and while he hasn’t come close to that this year in the Premier League, he did recently score in the FA Cup for Daniel Farke’s side, showing he’s still the fine finisher he’s been in the past.

More: Joël Piroe – The unlikely Leeds United connection vying to fire Suriname to the World Cup.

As is tradition, we’re wrapping up today with a bit of trivia. So, to kick things off, let’s go back to the start. The first men’s World Cup was held in 1930. Tell us: who played in the final and what was the scoreline?

Email us with your answers for a chance to win a much-coveted MiB patch!

👋 We’ll see you again tomorrow. In the meantime, keep sending your stories and questions to [email protected].

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