Attending a major sporting event can be exhausting, expensive, and demeaning. But there has always been at least one game-day opportunity that can provide a little bit of satisfaction: the ability to buy an ice-cold bottle of water from a guy with a cooler in the parking lot for a buck or two, and then bring your prize into the stadium. Look at you, all hydrated and frugal!
Because FIFA seems dead-set on making this year’s World Cup as hostile to attendees as possible, however, soccer fans who have already spent at least a month’s salary on tickets are now being told that they can’t even bring cheap water into the stadium. This information comes to us from The Athletic, which has reviewed emails that FIFA sent out to ticket-holders this week, informing them of the reversal of a previous policy allowing sealed, plastic water bottles to be brought into stadiums:
However, according to emails seen by The Athletic, FIFA have informed World Cup ticket holders that they have updated the code of conduct and the correspondence told fans that “reusable water bottles are no longer permitted at the FIFA World Cup 2026™ stadiums”.
The code of conduct, which was updated on June 2, has removed the prior guidance permitting an empty and reusable plastic bottle. It now reads: “For the avoidance of doubt, reusable water bottles may not be brought into the stadium.”
Imagine it: You’ve just spent god knows how long stuffed onto an NJ Transit train with thousands of other people who each paid $98 for a ride to a group-stage game in New Jersey. It is 93 degrees out and the dew point is 71. After disembarking you shuffle along in a mass of people making its way across the scorching blacktop of the parking lot, after which you will stand in a long line at one of the entry gates while continuing to broil in the sun. By the time you make it into the stadium you are hot, tired, and more thirsty than you’ve ever been in your life. You can feel a terrible headache coming on. Now all you have to do before taking your seat is stand in another long line to buy a $7 bottle of water. You will miss the first 10 minutes of the game.
As we’ve pointed out before, a big reason why this World Cup feels so nasty is that FIFA has dropped any pretense that it sees North America, and the United States in particular, as anything more than a mature market to be looted for all its worth. That they are now reversing a policy that exists to prevent fans from getting heat stroke for the sake of squeezing a few more dollars in concessions out of those fans just speaks to how brazen and shameless FIFA has become.
At this point, don’t be surprised if the 2034 World Cup kicks off with Gianni Infantino addressing fans and bellowing, “Do not, my friends, become addicted to water. It will take hold of you, and you will resent its absence.”
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