{"id":38217,"date":"2026-06-27T15:42:10","date_gmt":"2026-06-27T13:42:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/?post_type=news&#038;p=38217"},"modified":"2026-06-27T15:42:33","modified_gmt":"2026-06-27T13:42:33","slug":"world-cup-sets-all-time-attendance-record-surpassing-1994-mark","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/world-cup-sets-all-time-attendance-record-surpassing-1994-mark\/","title":{"rendered":"World Cup sets all-time attendance record, surpassing 1994 mark"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The 2026 World Cup on Thursday became the best-attended in the tournament&#8217;s history, surpassing \u200cthe 1994 record of nearly 3.6 million spectators, FIFA said.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The announcement came during the second half of Germany&#8217;s match against Ecuador in East Rutherford, NJ, as jumbotrons flashed with the \u2060new all-time high, 3 605 357, \u00a0to uproarious applause.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>With 48 matches remaining in the World Cup, total attendance could conceivably nearly double the 1994 record, which came during an era in which the World Cup contained only 52 matches. Stadiums have been more than 99% full on average.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Well-documented high ticket \u200cprices, \u2060along with President Donald Trump&#8217;s administration travel restrictions on certain nations, mean there may be many people who wished to be at the tournament but \u2060could not attend, said economist Victor Matheson, a sports business expert at the College of the Holy Cross.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>But \u2060there were plenty of fans ready to take their spots. &#8220;Americans \u00a0want to be there for \u2060the big moments,&#8221; said Dan Rascher, a sports economics expert at the University of San Francisco.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;Reuters&#8211;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":38218,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"news-type":[305,20],"class_list":["post-38217","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-special-projects","news-type-sport","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"2026 World Cup on Thursday became the best-attended in the tournament's history","published_date":"2026-06-27 15:42:22","news_description":"2026 World Cup on Thursday became the best-attended in the tournament's history","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/38217","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/38217\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":38220,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/38217\/revisions\/38220"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/38218"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38217"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=38217"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}