Steve Clarke sealed a dream return for the nation to the biggest football tournament on the planet and the excitement will be cranked up a notch
Everything you need to know about the World Cup draw
- The draw for the 2026 World Cup will take place on Friday, 5 December at the Kennedy Center in Washington DC at 5pm UK time (12 noon local time)
- The draw will be broadcast live on the BBC and BBC iPlayer from 5pm on December 5.
- The tournament itself will be held across three countries – USA, Mexico and Canada. It kicks off on June 11, with the final in New York on July 19 .
- It will be the biggest World Cup ever with 48 nations taking part – up from 32.
- 42 teams have qualified so far
Hosts: Canada, Mexico, United States
Africa: Algeria, Cape Verde, Egypt, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Morocco, Senegal, South Africa, Tunisia
Asia: Australia, Iran, Japan, Jordan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, Uzbekistan
Europe: Austria, Belgium, Croatia, England, France, Germany, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, SCOTLAND, Spain, Switzerland
Oceania: New Zealand
South America: Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Paraguay, Uruguay
North and Central America and the Caribbean: Curacao, Panama, Haiti
- Six more teams will qualify for the tournament via the play-offs. the 16 teams involved in the play-offs are: Italy, Poland, Republic of Ireland, Romania, Denmark, Wales, Albania, Sweden, Turkey, Czech Republic, Bosnia-Herzegovina, North Macedonia, Ukraine, Slovakia, Kosovo and Northern Ireland.
- You can keep up with all the draw drama right here on dailyrecord.co.uk! Record Sport will be running a live blog .
