World Cup 2026: Key questions surrounding final qualification matches

Let's follow Italy to show how its qualification journey could work. It's in a group with Northern Ireland, Wales and Bosnia and Herzegovina, but at most, it will only play two of those teams to clinch its World Cup spot. 

Italy will take on Northern Ireland first on Thursday, March 26. If it wins that match, it will advance to face the winner of the Wales vs Bosnia and Herzegovina match on Tuesday, March 31. If Italy wins that, it will qualify for the World Cup; if it loses at any point in this run, though, it will miss out on the finals entirely.

The two non-European spots are more complicated. Bolivia and Suriname will face off first; the winner of that match will take on the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and the winner of that match will go directly to the World Cup. New Caledonia and Jamaica will face off as well, with the winner of that matchup facing Iraq to determine which will go to the tournament finals:

The DR Congo and Iraq get to skip the opening round because of their strong performances in their own regional qualifying processes.

Which game paths will affect the USMNT?

Europe's Path C will directly affect the U.S. Men's National Team's World Cup journey. The winner of this qualifier will face the USMNT in its third and final group stage game in Los Angeles, California.

The four teams competing in Path C are Turkiye, Romania, Slovakia and Kosovo. Turkiye is considered the clear favorite to qualify for the World Cup, and if it does, it just might wind up being the USMNT's most difficult group stage opponent. The two teams played each other last summer in East Hartford, Connecticut, and Turkiye took down the USMNT 2-1 without too much trouble. It's a well-organized side featuring world-class young attackers like Real Madrid's Arda Guler and Juventus's Kenan Yildiz, and it packs a serious punch.

Which game paths will have the widest-reaching international implications?

Europe's Path A is a big one because it features the biggest team of all: Italy. Despite its status as one of the top soccer countries on Earth (and its recent European Championships victory in 2021), Italy hasn't qualified for a World Cup since the 2014 edition in Brazil. An entire generation of Italian children grew up without seeing gli Azzurri on the World Cup stage; if Italy can't get through this qualifier, then a second generation will suffer the same fate.

The two non-European paths will carry a lot of weight, too. New Caledonia and Suriname are competing for their first World Cup qualifications, while Jamaica, Bolivia and Iraq are competing for their first appearances in years. And DR Congo? It made one World Cup appearance in 1974 as Zaire, but it's morphed into one of the strongest teams in Africa and deserves its global reintroduction. If it's successful, it'll enter a fascinating group full of continental powerhouses: Portugal from Europe, Colombia from South America and Uzbekistan from Asia.

When do these game paths start and finish?

The first rounds of these playoffs will all kick off on Thursday, March 26. The final, decisive rounds will all kick off on Tuesday, March 31.