The date of the “decisive” match between Iraq and Bolivia to qualify for the World Cup… and the broadcast channel

The BBVA Stadium in the Mexican city of Monterrey will witness, on Wednesday morning (7 o’clock UAE time), the decisive match in the global playoff qualifiers for the 2026 World Cup in America, Mexico and Canada, where the Iraqi and Bolivia teams will compete for one of two cards decided through the global playoff, and the match will be broadcast live on the “BeIN Sports” channel network.
After the Iraqi national team ranked third in the second group in the third round of the Asian qualifiers for the World Cup, behind the teams of South Korea and Jordan, and ahead of Oman, Palestine and Kuwait, the team qualified for the Asian qualifier for the World Cup, and ranked second in the second group behind the Saudi team, which qualified directly for the World Cup, to meet the Emirati team that ranked second in the first group, to decide the identity of the Asian representative in the World Cup.
The Iraqi team succeeded in snatching the qualification ticket after drawing 1-1 in the first leg on its host’s soil, then succeeded in winning the return match at home with a score of 2-1, to qualify for the global playoff.
The draw placed the Iraqi team in the final match of the playoff against the winner of the match between Bolivia and Suriname in the semi-final.
Led by its Australian coach, Graham Arnold, the Iraqi national team aspires to qualify for the World Cup for the first time since the 1986 edition in Mexico, in which the team was eliminated from the group stage after three matches against Mexico, Belgium and Paraguay.
The Iraqi national team is armed with the experience of its top scorer, Ayman Hussein, the striker of the Al-Karma team in the Iraqi League, along with Ali Al-Hammadi, the English Luton Town player, Zidane Iqbal, the Dutch Utrecht midfielder, and Youssef Ayman, the Cypriot player of AEK Larnaca.
The Bolivia national team succeeded in defeating Suriname 2-1, after overcoming a deficit with a goal to win, giving them a pass to the final and the opportunity to realize the dream of qualifying for the World Cup.
The Bolivian national team participated three times in the World Cup, the first in the first edition of the competition in 1930, where it was eliminated in the group stage, and it followed the same pattern in its participation in the 1950 and 1994 editions.
The Bolivia national team reached the global playoff stage after finishing seventh in the South American qualifiers, where it achieved 6 victories, a draw in two matches, and a loss in ten matches out of 18 it played, to qualify for the global playoff.
The Bolivia national team, led by its coach Oscar Villejas, is seeking to pass the match against Iraq and qualify for the World Cup finals for the first time since 1994, which was also in America, as the team remained without any chances in the South American qualifiers, which include ten teams, including strong and ancient teams such as Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Colombia, Ecuador, Chile and others, which made the task very difficult for it.
But the team performed well in the qualifiers, and among the 6 victories it achieved, its victory over Brazil with a clean goal was among the best matches the team played in its qualifying campaign.
The team is armed with its young star, Miguel Angel Troceros, the Brazilian Santos player, who scored the winning goal for the team against Suriname after his teammate Moises Paniagua, the Moroccan Wydad player, scored the equalizer.
The decisive confrontation for the World Cup promotion ticket will be the second in the history of the two teams’ confrontations, and the first was in a friendly match on November 20, 2018, which ended in a goalless draw.
The winner of the confrontation between Iraq and Bolivia will play in Group Nine of the World Cup alongside France, Senegal and Norway.