Iran World Cup squad arrives in Mexico after US visa dispute

Iran’s World Cup 2026 squad arrived in Mexico on Sunday amid a diplomatic dispute after the United States refused to issue visas for some members of the team’s support staff.

Iran coach Amir Ghalenoei said on arrival at Tijuana airport that the team should have arrived earlier to adapt to the time difference. “We should have been here last week because a 12-hour time difference needs two weeks of adjusting. Usually in these tournaments, before technical matters, ethical and human considerations must be respected – which I think for us it was not the case.”

After leaving their training camp in Turkey a day earlier, the team landed at about 5am local time on Sunday in the Mexican border city of Tijuana. Iran will be based there throughout the tournament, despite playing all three of their group-stage matches in the United States.

Players and coaching staff disembarked under tight security, including Mexican national guard troops. Only a small number of fans waving Iranian flags were present at the airport.

The dispute has emerged just days before Thursday’s opening of the 2026 World Cup, hosted jointly by the United States, Mexico and Canada.

Ghalenoei thanked Fifa for its efforts to help secure entry but added: “We are upset about this behaviour. It has certainly never happened before.”

Team captain Ehsan Hajsafi said he wanted to raise his complaint with Fifa over the delay in obtaining US visas. “Why so late?” he said. “In the last year, we experienced two imposed wars in our country.” Hajsafi added that “the team is 100% ready” and said “we can advance” from the group stage.

Iran’s Group G matches are scheduled for Los Angeles against New Zealand on 15 June and Belgium on 21 June, and in Seattle against Egypt on 26 June. According to the article, this will be the first men’s World Cup in which a host nation receives the team of a country it is at war with.

The squad spent nearly three weeks at a training camp in Turkey, where they applied for visas to travel to Mexico, Canada and the United States. On the eve of departure, the players finally received their US visas, according to Washington’s envoy to Turkey, Tom Barrack.

Iran’s embassy in Turkey said support staff had been denied visas. An Iranian diplomat and state TV said 15 administrative and management staff were affected.

The embassy condemned what it called “deliberate and discriminatory treatment against Iran’s national football team” and called on Fifa “to hold the US accountable for violations of its rules.”

Iran’s ambassador to Mexico, Abolfazl Pasandideh, said on Saturday that the squad had been told that, under the terms of their visas, they must enter and leave US territory on the same day as their matches.

“We can enter in the morning and we must leave the same day,” Pasandideh told reporters. That appeared to conflict with comments by the team spokesman, Amir Mahdi Alavi, who told Iranian state television that the visas were multiple-entry and that the national team would arrive at the first match venue one day before the game and two days before the following matches.

Fifa rules for World Cups require a team’s coach to give a news conference at the match venue on the eve of the game.

Iran’s football federation, whose chief Mehdi Taj was reportedly among those denied a visa, described the decision as “political interference in sport in its worst form.”

A US administration official did not directly address the issue of those whose visas were refused, saying only: “We will not allow the Iranian team to abuse this system to sneak terrorists into the United States under false pretences.”