Could European countries really decide to boycott the World Cup this summer? It is an astonishing question to be asking in 2026 and an indictment of the bind in which, as Donald Trump sows confusion around a potential annexation of Greenland, the world’s most popular sport finds itself. But the idea is at least seeping into the mainstream and senior figures are asking what, in a worst-case scenario, it would take for football to meet the moment.
Unprecedented times call for previously unthinkable conversations. As the Guardian reported this week, an anniversary party for the Hungarian FA on Monday became the forum for unofficial discussions among national association heads about how a unified approach to the US-shaped problem might take shape.
While flexibility is essential in a volatile, fast-moving situation, there is an acceptance that nobody can afford to be asleep if the time for action comes.
That is why there is a growing belief that Europe’s governing bodies, whether led by individual federations or by Uefa itself, must cohere behind a common position – or at least prepare one. Sources have described a tightening of unity since Trump, whose suggestion on Wednesday he will not take Greenland by force – and later that there was the outlines of a deal – must surely be treated with caution.
While some federations are understood to have been relatively unbothered by the spectacle of Trump receiving a peace prize from the Fifa president, Gianni Infantino, in December, choosing in certain cases to find a funny side, the gravity of current events is lost on nobody.
The tight bond between Infantino’s leadership and the Trump administration means European football cannot look away. There is a consensus that Fifa has elected to politicise itself; that could bring consequences if the US president intensifies his designs on a territory that belongs, indisputably, to a Uefa member in Denmark.
Then there is the precedent of recent history. Russia was quickly frozen out of international competition after its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, essentially because other countries refused to compete against them. Why should the US be treated differently if it sent in the troops, and why should its part in the World Cup be indulged into the bargain?
Some key figures expect military aggression would be the breaking point for Uefa and the federations it covers. In the event Trump’s latest pronouncements stand the test of time, it means any whispers about a boycott will remain hushed for now. It remains a far-flung prospect.
None of Europe’s FAs are in a rush to go public with a stance and plenty may follow their governments’ positions. The question is whether that would be enough for those who feel football has a unique opportunity to assert itself.
The French sports minister, Marina Ferrari, said on Tuesday, in response to calls from elsewhere on the political spectrum, that the country has no plan to boycott but added the caveat “as it stands now”. But the German minister for sports, Christiane Schenderlein, deflected any decision making to “the competent sports associations”.
There are certainly some within football’s corridors of power who feel a stand could be made while politicians prevaricate. Trump has wedded himself to the World Cup project since his first term, naturally making mention of his own hard work in steering the bid when it succeeded in 2018.
The prospect of visible, palpable damage to his latest big moment would not be easy for the president to stomach. Perhaps, if Uefa and its federations flexed their muscles, Infantino could even feel compelled to engage in far-reaching diplomacy with his friend around the Greenland problem.
Some within Uefa would strain at the leash to see Infantino put in his place. Football’s biggest governing bodies endured a high-profile falling-out in May over Infantino’s conduct around the Fifa congress in Paraguay, although it was quickly smoothed over in public. More moderate forces close to the organisation may not favour incendiary moves this time, with the future of global football facing enough uncertainty, but the sport has been planted in uncharted waters and could find it needs to swim hard.
The hypotheticals continue but they cannot be purely dismissed as such. Recent events have underlined that football’s leadership must be agile and the message is hitting home. Initiatives such as the hugely popular petition in the Netherlands, urging a boycott of the World Cup, suggest public sentiment would be supportive of decisive action if the unthinkable came to pass.
The pitch may quietly have been rolled. The enduring hope is that, for reasons in which football is unpleasantly enmeshed, it never needs testing out.
