MLSPA head rips league’s lack of World Cup urgency: Should be ‘significant moves’

MLS Players Association executive director Bob Foose hasn’t been impressed with what he’s seen from America’s top domestic soccer league a little more than a year away from the 2026 World Cup, the majority of which will take place on U.S. soil. 

Major League Soccer is entering its 30th season of existence when it begins play this upcoming weekend, but Foose contented that not enough was being done to capitalize on the “momentum” that comes with hosting the biggest sports tournament on the planet in the coming year. 

“I’ve been disappointed in how little has been done so far to build on that momentum internally,” Foose told ESPN about MLS’ lack of capitalization on the lead-up to the 2026 World Cup. “There’s still some time, but in my opinion, there should have been significant moves made over the last 12 to 18 months and then continuing up through the World Cup. The system needs to be streamlined, it needs to be opened up. Clubs need to be able to compete better and we need to be able to go out and present to the world a different MLS coming out of the back end of the World Cup than that which was there before. 

“And some of that growth has happened, but in my opinion not enough. And I think as a result we’re in danger of not capitalizing on the World Cup in the way that we could have.” 

American soccer officials expect the 2026 World Cup – taking place across the United States and sites in Canada and Mexico – will help boost the profile of the sport in the States, something MLS will surely hope to ride the wave of.

MLS is considering a change in its schedule that would align it with the way leagues overseas set their schedule, which is a fall-to-spring calendar. 

“Making those changes is something we’ve got to be very, very thoughtful about. I do think that we are considering, more than ever before, this opportunity to change. But it’s not something that we’re ready to talk about right now,” MLS commissioner Don Garber said head of the MLS Cup Final last season. 

A change of that nature would fall in line with the way MLS executive vice president of sporting and competition Nelson Rodriguez believed any monetization of the World Cup would play out for the league. 

That it would come after the tournament’s conclusion and would take play at a more local level. 

“Creating a connection between the World Cup and MLS at those local levels through players or through our clubs or more broadly through the sport itself,” Rodriguez said.