FIFA and the International Football Association Board -IFAB- are advancing a package of sporting, disciplinary and financial measures for the 2026 World Cup, which will be held in the United States, Canada and Mexico. The new framework includes an additional yellow-card amnesty, potential red cards for covering the mouth in confrontational situations or leaving the pitch in protest, an increase of more than 100 million dollars in financial distribution to teams, and talks over a tax exemption on US soil.

The tournament will be the first with 48 teams and 104 matches, compared with the previous format of 32 teams and 64 games. That expansion adds an extra knockout round, more travel, higher logistical costs and greater disciplinary exposure for players, leading FIFA to move several pieces before an edition that is also expected to be the most lucrative in its history.

New rules to protect the spectacle and regulate conduct

The first planned change concerns accumulated yellow cards. FIFA will introduce a system under which all bookings are wiped at the end of the group stage and again after the quarter-finals, whereas in previous editions they were only cleared after that latter round. The measure appears designed to reduce the risk of players missing decisive matches through accumulation in a longer World Cup, especially with the addition of the round of 32.

The decision favours the spectacle by increasing the chances that important players are available for the most high-profile knockout matches, while also maintaining competitive equality because it would apply under the same conditions to all teams. More delicate will be the application of the new red-card measures approved by IFAB: at the discretion of the competition organiser, players may be sent off if they cover their mouth in a confrontation with an opponent or leave the field of play in protest at a refereeing decision, as may team officials who incite their players to leave the pitch.

The origin of the sanctions and the limits FIFA will need to clarify

The rule on covering the mouth responds to a problem football has been carrying for some time: offensive comments, insults or discriminatory expressions that some players try to hide from cameras, referees and opponents. The recent case involving Vinícius Júnior and Gianluca Prestianni, later sanctioned by UEFA for homophobic conduct, has placed the gesture at the centre of the disciplinary debate. In that sense, the World Cup can serve as a high-level test to assess whether this regulation should later be extended to other leagues and international competitions.

The sanction for leaving the pitch in protest has as its background the controversial final of the 2026 Africa Cup of Nations, in which Senegal players left the field after a refereeing decision, before the result was awarded to Morocco by the Confederation of African Football -CAF- and appealed by Senegal before the Court of Arbitration for Sport -CAS-. FIFA will need to explain and define the rule carefully, because not every walk-off has the same context: leaving the pitch in protest at a refereeing decision is not the same as leaving after racist chants or serious abuse if a player believes he is not being protected.

More money to compete in the most expensive World Cup

The financial block will also be central to the 2026 World Cup. FIFA has approved an increase in financial distribution for the 48 teams to 871 million dollars, with a guaranteed base of 12.5 million for each federation. The increase includes preparation money, a minimum qualifying reward, subsidies for delegation costs and larger ticket allocations, in a tournament that will require more staff, more travel, more logistics and higher operational spending.

The measure has an obvious logic: it would make little sense for a team to qualify for the World Cup and end up losing money in the most important competition in international football, especially for federations with fewer resources. Alongside that, FIFA is negotiating with the US Treasury, with the involvement of the World Cup taskforce linked to Donald Trump, so federations can apply for a federal tax exemption in the United States, although that route would not be automatic and would not necessarily remove state or local taxes. The combination of higher prize money, participation support and tax relief exposes an underlying tension: FIFA is projecting record revenues, especially from ticketing and hospitality, but football should not be reduced to a business operation in a competition that still presents itself as the highest global expression of the sport