Charlie Davies joins CBS News as 2026 World Cup begins

A bigger World Cup is here, and Charlie Davies is one of the familiar American voices helping explain what makes it different. The 2026 FIFA World Cup opened Thursday with Mexico facing South Africa at Mexico City Stadium, also known as Estadio Azteca, after opening-ceremony festivities in Mexico City.

The tournament is unlike any previous edition. FIFA’s first 48-team World Cup features 104 matches, an additional knockout round and a schedule that runs through Sunday, July 19, with the final set for New York/New Jersey. FIFA has confirmed 1,248 players on final squad lists representing 48 nations, and the competition is being staged across 16 host cities in Canada, Mexico and the United States.

Davies brings a direct U.S. lens to that scale. A former U.S. Men’s National Team player, he joined CBS Sports as a soccer analyst in June 2021 and now serves as a studio analyst for CBS Sports’ CONCACAF coverage and the CBS Sports Golazo Network’s Morning Footy. CBS said his reaction to the 2026 World Cup draw left him “really encouraged,” a view that fits a network leaning on former players to help make sense of a tournament that stretches across three countries.

For host cities, the demands are immediate. Sixteen venues must absorb a 104-game schedule, along with the travel, security, training, media and broadcast demands that come with a global event spread across borders. The opener in Mexico City and the final in New York/New Jersey bookend a competition designed to put North American soccer infrastructure under a spotlight from start to finish.

For American sports audiences, the payoff could be larger than any single match. A month-long tournament played on U.S. soil, with heavy involvement from Canada and Mexico and a final in the New York area, gives soccer a chance to sit more squarely in the national conversation. If the expanded format delivers the attention FIFA is seeking, the 2026 World Cup could leave a deeper imprint on mainstream American sports than any edition before it.