Can World Cup fuel North America's soccer boom?

FIFA is expected to make a record $11 billion revenue from the 2026 World Cup (Michael M. Santiago)

(Michael M. Santiago/GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/Getty Images via AFP)

Long considered soccer's last great unconquered market, North America has embraced the beautiful game to a stunning degree over the past few decades -- and the upcoming World Cup could accelerate that boom.

Visit Miami's Nu Stadium -- one of the roughly dozen Major League Soccer stadiums built across the region in the past decade, and the new home of Lionel Messi -- and the enthusiasm is impossible to miss.

Or attend a sports bar in Los Angeles for an early morning English Premier League kickoff, and it will likely be packed with fans, most with American accents.

Mia Hamm, an icon of the United States women's multiple World Cup-winning team in the 1990s, told AFP she is still amazed at the number of Americans she sees wearing their favorite club's soccer shirts these days, as she travels around the country.

"You didn't see that when I was growing up playing," she recalled.

"It was just the small soccer community... (now) you can go along the street here in Los Angeles, in the country, people know the players."

The numbers bear out Hamm's observations.

When American sports fans are asked to name their favorite sport, "football's quite comfortably in third place," behind only American football and basketball, Daniel Monaghan ofresearch firm Ampere Analysis told AFP.

Soccer has edged ahead of baseball since at least 2021, when the survey began, and the gap widened considerably last year, when 15 percent said soccer and eight percent baseball.

• Cash cow -

The surge in popularity is matched by an explosion in financial value.

FIFA is expected to make a record $11 billion revenue from the 2026 World Cup. But soccer dollars were already on the rise before the cash cow of the world's biggest tournament.

Spending on soccer media rights in America -- including everything from MLS and US national team games to the various European leagues -- also surpasses baseball.