Football vs. Fútbol: Will NFL Bend Schedule for FIFA World Cup?
There may not be any football games this March. Instead, fútbol is taking center stage.
Thursday night, the United States will look to inch closer to qualifying for its first FIFA World Cup since 2014 in a match against archrival Mexico.
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Dan Hamilton/USA Today Sports
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The goal for the U.S. is to not only qualify for the World Cup in Qatar, but make it all the way to the Final, scheduled for Dec. 18 which ... happens to fall on a Sunday during the NFL season.
This is the first time any such schedule conflict has come up because the FIFA World Cup is traditionally a summer event. However, the host nation Qatar, located near the equator, is too hot to host a summer tournament and FIFA agreed to shift to the winter months.
The NFL and FIFA are two massive fish in the sports pond. But will the NFL move its schedule for the biggest day in soccer?
We likely won't know the answer until the NFL schedule is released next month, but there is a decent chance at least some games are moved to the day before on Saturday, December 17.
With the FIFA World Cup Final expected to air on FOX around 11:00 a.m. EST, there's likely no scenario where the network is able to broadcast any games that day, at least in the early window. Chances are, the NFL will reserve two or three games to be played on the Sunday in primetime and move the rest of the games to Thursday, Saturday or Monday.
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The following week, the NFL might also have to alter its traditional schedule given the fact that Christmas falls on Sunday. The NBA's biggest regular-season TV day of the year is traditional its slew of games on Christmas.
The last time Christmas fell on a Sunday was in 2016. That year the NFL only scheduled two games on Sunday, and pushed the rest of the non-primetime games on Christmas Eve Saturday.
In the last two seasons, the NFL has been extremely flexible in moving games due to coronavirus outbreaks, even scheduling some games on Tuesdays and Wednesdays to ensure games will be played. Now, the NFL and commissioner Roger Goodell has months to figure out how to work around this once-in-a-lifetime scheduling conflict.
