It’s all set. We’re going to be a home-away-from-home sanctuary for world-class global soccer teams beginning early June.
Argentina, the defending world champs featuring FIFA’s best player, Lionel Messi, will be practicing at Sporting KCs facility near Legends, staying at Hotel Savoy downtown.
England’s Three Lions soccer team, ranked 4th in the world, will be practicing in Swope Park Soccer Village and staying at the Inn at Meadowbrook in Prairie Village.
The Netherlands team, ranked 7th best this year, will be training at KC Current’s University of Kansas Health Training Center in Riverside, and staying at Hotel Kansas City downtown.
Algeria’s team, one of Africa’s top teams, is back in the World Cup for the first time since 2014. They will be training at KU’s Rock Chalk Park and staying at The Oread in Lawrence. They play Argentina in the first match at Arrowhead June 17.
All but England will play at Arrowhead during the tournament, but England could advance to an Arrowhead playoff match July 3. All teams will be travelling back and forth from their KC-area base camps to matches in other cities.
The teams made their base camp selections following look-sees in January after FIFA had determined the teams’ schedules and tournament play. One of the deciding factors was the city’s central US location and the $650 million spent on soccer infrastructure over the past 15 years.
All base camps and hotels have been confirmed, however the final details are still being ironed out. “It’s a more complex process than I think people might understand,” says Pam Kramer, CEO of KC2026, the nonprofit overseeing strategy and managing host city duties. “You’ve got the venue, you’ve got the team, you’ve got the hotel, you’ve got FIFA, you’ve got the host committee—all who need to be consulted.”
England visited first a year ago, according to Alan Dietrich, the former Sporting KC COO and a consultant on base camp logistics working with KC2026. “FIFA told England reps to hold on while they developed base camp criteria, which they released in September.” FIFA allowed teams to choose base camps according to the “pot,” which is a FIFA ranking system of 12 teams in each of four pots. Argentina, England and the Netherlands are in pot 1, the highest ranked teams. Algeria is in pot 3.
Each team had specific needs for their base camps and their hotels. England’s representatives are detailed planners, Dietrich says. “They mapped out exactly how their training room would be structured, how their players would move through the training facility, how they would handle their media, and where they would do their own social media podcasting.”
The real draw for Algeria’s lodging facility was that they wanted a tranquil environment, Dietrich says. “They were looking for something that when the players weren’t practicing, they could be outside where it would be just calm, and it was beautiful, relaxing and restorative. So when we went to Lawrence, that just worked out perfectly.”
He expects to see players and coaches enjoying many of the city’s amenities on the Plaza, Legends, Zona Rosa, the Power and Light district, Loose Park and elsewhere.
With teams here for 30-plus days playing matches and working out there’s a chance for the Kansas City community to engage in a very different way, says Kramer.
“What it could be like is baseball spring training, where the teams are part of a community for an extended period of time, and fans come to be close to the team,” Kramer says. “But fans also connect to the communities where those teams have spring training. So I think that’s the mindset that I would have for the cultural and community opportunity.”
“Our residents will adopt these teams,” Dietrich says. “They will become fans of these teams and root for them as they go through the tournament. So it’s going to have a cool impact.”
In other words: this isn’t just a sporting event. It’s a month-long international residency program.
And for Kansas City, it’s a chance to show the world not only how we host—but how we welcome.
