Team Norway to hold free public practice at UNCG Stadium

Team Norway’s free open practice at UNCG Soccer Stadium will give Greensboro a rare World Cup-era showcase, with fans able to watch the national team on Wednesday, June 10, before the 2026 tournament opens the next day.

Gates will open at 4 p.m., and training will begin at 5 p.m. The session is Norway’s only scheduled public practice during its time in Greensboro, which makes the event more than a fan perk. It is a public sign that Guilford County is already inside the World Cup travel economy, with hotel rooms, restaurant tables, rides and visitor spending likely to feel the ripple effects long before kickoff.

Greensboro city government announced March 10 that the city will serve as the Norwegian National Football Team’s Team Base Camp city, with the University of North Carolina at Greensboro designated as the team’s training facility. The Norwegian Football Association said on January 24 that Greensboro was its first-choice base camp, placing the Triad city in a select group of host communities that will support the world’s biggest soccer tournament from June 11 through July 19, 2026.

The choice also gives local officials a concrete test case for sports tourism. A Greensboro tourism fact sheet says the city hosted 14 soccer events in 2023, drawing 66,000 people and contributing more than $67 million to the local economy. That record helps explain why leaders have leaned into the World Cup opportunity: soccer visitors do not just fill a stadium, they spread spending across hotels, meals, parking, transportation and retail.

Greensboro’s visitor bureau says the city has more than 500 restaurants, more than 98 accommodations and 135 attractions, a hospitality network that could benefit from the increased attention. For businesses near UNCG and along the city’s main hotel corridors, an elite team practicing in public can turn a one-day event into broader awareness of the city as a destination.

UNCG Soccer Stadium, completed in 1991, seats 3,540, making the practice a close-up event rather than a large commercial show. That setting matters for residents who want a more intimate look at the team, and it matters for the city’s branding too. A venue built for college soccer is now part of an international tournament setup.

FIFA expanded its Team Base Camp brochure to 49 potential sites in late 2024 and added 14 more options in April 2025 as teams prepared for the tournament. Greensboro’s inclusion in that mix shows how local infrastructure, university facilities and tourism capacity are being folded into the World Cup system. For Guilford County, Norway’s public practice is both a community event and an early measure of how much the tournament can lift the local economy.