World Cup opens with Mexico-South Africa rematch in record tournament

Mexico opened the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup with a 2-0 victory over South Africa at Estadio Azteca in Mexico City, launching a tournament built for scale as much as spectacle. The field has expanded to a record 48 teams, with 104 matches spread across 16 host cities in Canada, Mexico and the United States. This opener also carried a rare symmetry: it repeated the 2010 World Cup’s first match, the first time the tournament has ever begun with the same pairing from a prior edition.

That makes the tactical and emotional stakes in this match easier to miss if the scoreline is all that gets remembered. Lori Lindsey, a former U.S. Women’s National Team midfielder who made 31 appearances from 2005 to 2013, brings the kind of perspective that cuts through the ceremony. Having played in the 2011 FIFA Women’s World Cup, where the U.S. won silver, and at the 2012 London Olympics, where it took gold, Lindsey understands how much opening matches are shaped by nerves, spacing and the first 15 minutes of control rather than by reputation alone.

Her broadcast work now gives her a sharp lens on those margins. Lindsey works as a match analyst for MLS on Apple TV and serves as lead analyst for CBS Sports’ NWSL coverage, a résumé that puts her in position to read the details casual viewers often miss: how teams settle into pressing triggers, whether the midfield holds its shape under early pressure, and how an opener can reward the side that manages uncertainty best. In a World Cup with more teams, more matches and more logistical complexity than any before it, those small choices matter even more.

Mexico’s result also tied the opener directly to tournament history. The 2010 first match between Mexico and South Africa was remembered for its symbolic weight and for Siphiwe Tshabalala’s famous goal. Fifteen years later, the same nations met again to start a World Cup that will unfold across three countries and stretch the sport’s competitive geography. For Javier Aguirre’s Mexico, the opening win gave the host side an immediate lift; for South Africa, the rematch confirmed how much pressure can sit inside a match that doubles as a global stage setter.

The tournament now moves on from a one-night opening to a month-long test of depth, resilience and precision. In a World Cup this large, the first result already hinted at the difference between a commemorative opener and a team prepared to control the next 103 matches.