The World Cup returns to North America this summer for the first time since 1994, when the United States hosted a tournament that shattered attendance records, produced some of the most dramatic moments in the competition’s history, and changed the landscape of American soccer forever.
With those who like to bet already looking ahead to 2026, it is worth pausing to remember what made the original North American edition so unforgettable.
The setting
Sceptics predicted empty stadiums and cultural indifference when FIFA awarded the 1994 tournament to the United States in 1988. The country had no top-tier professional soccer league and limited mainstream interest in the sport. What followed silenced almost every critic.
The tournament drew 3.587 million spectators across 52 matches at nine venues, an average of nearly 69,000 per game that still stands as the highest in World Cup history. The Rose Bowl in Pasadena hosted the final in front of 94,194 people, the largest crowd ever to attend a World Cup final. The tournament’s commercial success directly led to the creation of Major League Soccer the following year.
Brazil and the final
Brazil won their fourth World Cup title in the most dramatic circumstances the final had ever produced. Italy and Brazil played out a goalless 120 minutes at the Rose Bowl before the tournament’s decisive moment arrived.
Roberto Baggio, Italy’s brilliant number 10, who had carried his nation almost single-handedly through the knockout rounds with five goals, stepped up to take the final penalty with the shootout poised at 3-2 to Brazil. He struck it over the crossbar. Brazil lifted the trophy. Baggio stood with his hands on his hips, head bowed, in an image that became one of the most reproduced in the sport’s history.
Maradona’s exit
The 1994 tournament was supposed to be Diego Maradona’s final World Cup farewell. After leading Argentina to the 1986 title and the 1990 final, he arrived in the United States determined to go out on his own terms.
He scored against Greece in the group stage, running towards the camera with eyes wild and veins visibly bulging, a moment of pure feral intensity that encapsulated everything about his personality. Days later, he tested positive for a banned substance and was expelled from the tournament. His World Cup career ended not with glory but with controversy, as so much of it had.
Bulgaria’s extraordinary run
One of the great underdog stories in World Cup history unfolded across three weeks in American summer heat. Bulgaria, who had never previously won a single World Cup match in five previous tournaments, went to the semi-finals.
Hristo Stoichkov was the driving force, sharing the Golden Boot with Russia’s Oleg Salenko on six goals each, but the defining moment came in the quarter-finals when Stoichkov and Yordan Letchkov scored to eliminate reigning world champions Germany. Stoichkov subsequently won the 1994 Ballon d’Or.
The nations who missed out
Not every great football nation made it to the United States. England odds going into 2026 reflect a nation with genuine World Cup ambitions, but 32 years ago, the Three Lions were absent from the tournament entirely, having failed to qualify in a group containing Norway and the Netherlands.
France also missed out, as did Uruguay. Their absences gave the tournament a different character and opened the door for nations like Bulgaria, Romania, and Nigeria, who appeared at their first World Cup and were immediately adopted by neutrals after giving Italy a serious scare in the group stage.