PARIS, Dec 2 : Debutants will take centre stage at Friday’s 2026 World Cup draw along with concerns over heat, player welfare and the practical challenge of staging football’s biggest tournament across three countries during the peak of a North American summer.

For the first time in the tournament’s history, 48 teams will be divided into 12 groups of four at a ceremony in Washington, D.C., producing a 104-match schedule across 16 host cities in the U.S., Canada and Mexico.

Soccer's world governing body FIFA has framed the expansion as a watershed moment for inclusivity, opening the door for nations that had never qualified before - Cape Verde, Uzbekistan, Jordan and Curacao, which, with a population of 150,000, is by far the smallest nation to take part.

Others, such as Haiti, return af

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