World Cup 2026 live: Gianni Infantino to give major press conference on eve of tournament

Netflix ‘begged’ to stream 40 consecutive episodes of Lineker’s ‘The Rest is Football’ podcast during the World Cup, which will seek to challenge Gary Neville’s ‘Stick to Football’ for cut-through rather than the BBC or ITV.

Jamie Braidwood takes a look behind the scenes at the New York bachelor pad from where Lineker, Micah Richards and company will be streaming.

Iran have threatened to halt their matches at the World Cup if unauthorised flags are displayed or chants considered offensive are heard inside stadiums, according to reports from Tehran quoting sports minister Ahmad Donyamali.

“We have informed Fifa that if unofficial flags are brought or slogans against the national team are chanted in the stadiums where Iran plays in the World Cup, the team manager will definitely be responsible for stopping the match,” Donyamali reportedly said. “We have been assured that no disruptive incidents will occur in the stadium during the match against Egypt.”

It was previously reported that of officials from Iran and Egypt had both demanded no messages of support for the LGBT community are displayed when they meet in Seattle on June 26

Iran open their Group G campaign against New Zealand in Los Angeles on June 15 and face Belgium on June 21.

Anyone unfortunate enough to have watched much of the Club World Cup last year will have noted a couple of long weather delays that disrupted the tournament. Such a scenario could occur again over the next few weeks:

Time to get ahead of ourselves – here’s England’s possible route to the World Cup final, which I’m sure will go down well after a shock group stage exit.

Thomas Tuchel says that England’s players are ready to ‘push’ through the rest of their pre-camp as they continue their preparations for the start of the World Cup 2026.

Thomas Tuchel was pretty cautious over Bukayo Saka’s fitness ahead of England’s clash with Costa Rica, warning that the Arsenal forward would have to be managed during the tournament.

“We still have to take care a little bit about Bukayo, who had an injury in the March camp and carried it through, of course, into his club campaign,” Tuchel said. “He was available and made himself available in the end of the season, and did this brilliantly, but he was managed in-between matches and that continues a little bit at the very moment, so we’re building him up.”

Will Thomas Tuchel tip his hand with his England selection tonight? The manager now has a full squad with which to work, and his choice at No 10 might be indicative with Jude Bellingham and Morgan Rogers battling for one spot.

It’s about six hours until England kick off their final World Cup warm-up against Costa Rica in Miami, with Djed Spence likely to feature again after providing the assist for Harry Kane against New Zealand. The Tottenham full-back is playing through a broken jaw, and is set to wear a protective mask for the duration of the tournament.