While many NFL teams may play on synthetic turf in their stadiums, the FIFA World Cup plays its games on real turf – making it a challenge for many of the North American stadiums hosting the event in 2026 to adapt their playing fields to the NFL stadiums that are hosting games.
Scientists at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville and Michigan State University have been tasked with the job to develop natural turf for the 16 stadiums that will host games across the U.S., Canada and Mexico as the Knoxville News Sentinel reported.
Half of the stadiums being used for the tournament are either entirely closed or semi-enclosed, adding to the challenges for the scientists entrusted with coming up with the right grasses to ensure safe playing fields for the elite athletes.
Other challenges that the turf team must consider when growing the grass are the varying climate zones and time zones where the stadiums reside. With the widespread distance of games spread across an entire continent, the challenge is greater than it was in 2022, when all the games were in a small nation, Qatar.
The article said that Tennessee scientists have been working with FIFA since 2021 on research trials to study the varieties of grass required and the measures that are necessary to grow grass in the domed stadiums with grow lights.
As part of the research effort, FIFA constructed an indoor research building on the Tennessee campus. The facility replicates a domed World Cup Soccer stadium. FIFA’s turf leader says the 2026 tournament is the toughest turf challenge the soccer organization has faced.
“We’ve got stadiums in Mexico, U.S. and Canada, so probably the most diverse tournament footprint ever. I think that’s pretty safe to say,” says Alan Ferguson, FIFA’s senior pitch management manager. “And it comes with a special set of challenges.”
Dave Lubach is executive editor of the facilities market.
