Infantino, World Tour: sees almost all the matches flying everywhere

From Mexico City to Guadalajara, from Los Angeles to Vancouver, passing through San Francisco and Miami. If the 2026 World Cup was presented as the biggest tournament in history, the flying president took things decidedly seriously and had patience with waste or pollution. Gianni Infantino wants to live it to the full, he is in fact trying to attend two matches a day whenever the calendar allows, using a private jet made available by Qatar Airways as part of the sponsorship agreement with the international federation. The news comes from the British Guardian which explored this unprecedented logistical marathon and with some small opaque areas.

infant lord of the heavens

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In detail, after attending the inaugural match in Mexico City, the FIFA president immediately flew to Guadalajara to follow South Korea’s success over the Czech Republic. Then the following day he was here in Los Angeles for the United States’ victory against Paraguay, before moving between San Francisco and Vancouver to watch the matches between Qatar and Switzerland and Australia and Turkey. And on Sunday he rested: a break to take part in a summit in Miami with the 211 affiliated federations. In the evening, however, another take-off towards Los Angeles to watch Iran’s debut against New Zealand. FIFA say that he will maintain this pace for much of the tournament and it is certainly not the same challenge as Qatar 2022: four years ago Infantino managed to be present at almost all 64 matches thanks to an event concentrated in the same location, but the maximum distance between two stadiums was just 74 kilometres, more or less as far away as Pochettino’s US training centre, just outside the city, compared to the SoFi Stadium in LA where he played on his debut. This is America, where everything is giant in nature and ambition. The World Cup, then, is spread across three countries, four time zones and 16 stadiums distributed between the United States, Canada and Mexico. In some cases, the distance between the plants exceeds 4,500 kilometers. It’s a feat to travel to the national teams with a rigid schedule, let alone for a single president on a mission, forced to fit in between varied commitments.

waste and pollution

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According to calculations, no one will travel as much as the 56-year-old Infantino, he will even surpass Italy’s executioner Bosnia, the most “unlucky” because it is forced to move between Toronto, Los Angeles and Seattle, accumulating over 5,000 kilometers of travel, to which must be added the returns to the headquarters in Salt Lake City. This aerial dynamism, however, was not liked by everyone and this is where the problem falls: the theme of sustainability in an event of this type in this age of waste is deeply felt. For example, the New Weather Institute, an independent think tank based in the United Kingdom that deals with climate, sustainability and the transformation of economic systems, has defined the 2026 World Cup as “the most polluting sporting event ever”, estimating overall emissions in the order of 9 million tonnes of CO₂. The most significant share would be linked to air transport, responsible for around 7.7 million tonnes: from this point of view, Infantino’s jets zigzagging across the continent certainly don’t help. Even if the ambition to be present at as many events as possible in his role is noble, the debate on the environmental price of the new format is starting to make noise. In a scenario like this, Gianni Infantino’s daily tour becomes the perfect symbol of this tournament: a gigantic, ambitious and borderless World Cup, but still the most dispersed and discussed in history.