The 2026 World Cup will kick off on June 11 with joint-hosts Mexico playing South Africa at the Azteca Stadium — venue of the 1970 and 1986 finals — followed by South Korea against a playoff winner after the draw was made on Friday.

South Africa are appearing for the first time since 2010, when they drew with Mexico in the opening match but failed to reach the knockout stage.

Fellow hosts the United States and Canada will join the party the next day, against Paraguay and a playoff winner — possibly Italy — respectively in Los Angeles and Toronto.

Defending champions Argentina were grouped with Algeria, Austria and Jordan, while five-times winners Brazil will play Morocco — semi-finalists in 2022 — Haiti and Scotland.

The Scots are appearing in the finals for the first time since 1998, when they lost to Brazil in the opening game.

France’s first game will be against Senegal in a repeat of one of the biggest tournament upsets, when the Africans stunned the then-holders in their first game of the 2002 tournament.

England will start against Croatia, who beat them in the 2018 semi-finals, and also face Panama, who they beat 6-1 in the group stage in the same tournament.

The teams outside the hosts’ groups will have to wait until Saturday to find out the venues and kickoff times for their games after FIFA attempts to optimise venues and kickoff times relating to the various worldwide TV markets.

A newly introduced seeding system ensures that the current top four in the world — Spain, holders Argentina, 2022 runners-up France and England — cannot meet until the semi-final stage if they win their groups.

The 48 teams — including six still-to-be-decided playoff winners — were divided into 12 groups of four to produce a mammoth 104-match schedule across 16 cities in the U.S., Canada and Mexico, culminating in the final in New Jersey on July 19.

Venues and kickoff times will be announced in another globally broadcast event on Saturday, though even that is subject to adjustment in March once the six playoff qualification spots have been filled.

US President Donald Trump said he was not attending the draw for the 2026 World Cup to receive a prize, but he got one anyway.

Trump, who has campaigned aggressively this year for a Nobel Peace Prize, was given FIFA’s inaugural peace prize for his efforts to promote dialogue and de-escalation in some of the world’s hotspots.

Amid TV cameras and flashbulbs from the international press, Trump dominated the scene at Washington’s Kennedy Center on Friday, placing himself squarely at the center of one of the biggest events in the sporting world.

The United States, along with Canada and Mexico, will host the soccer tournament next year. The prime minister of Canada, Mark Carney, and the president of Mexico, Claudia Sheinbaum, were there, too, but it was all Trump’s show.

“This will be unique, this will be stellar, this will be spectacular,” Gianni Infantino, the gregarious president of FIFA, soccer’s global governing body, said at the opening of the ceremony, talking about next year’s games.

But he could have been talking about the Kennedy Center event itself, which was located in Washington at Trump’s urging.

Italian tenor Andrea Bocelli sang “Nessun Dorma,” a favorite of Trump’s and a staple at his campaign rallies, to launch the proceedings.

“Nobody ever thought a thing like this could happen,” Trump said before proceedings got under way, omitting the fact that the United States hosted the World Cup in 1994.

Last month, FIFA announced that a new annual award called the FIFA Peace Prize would be presented at the draw to “reward individuals who have taken exceptional and extraordinary actions for peace.”

A video prior to the presentation celebrated Trump for resolving the war in Gaza and trying to end Russia’s war in Ukraine. The trophy, a gold-plated globe carried by upraised hands, was considerably larger than the Nobel, which is just a simple medal.

But Trump got a medal as well and donned it as Infantino lauded him. The president deserved the award for “promoting peace and unity around the world,” Infantino said.

Trump called the award “an awfully nice tribute to you and the game of football, or as we call it, soccer.”

He took a moment to congratulate himself. America, he said, was “not doing too well” before he took office.

“Now, I have to say, we’re the hottest country anywhere in the world,” Trump said.

Trump received the award the same week his administration froze immigration applications from 19 countries after last week’s shooting of two National Guard members in Washington.

It also came days after the president demeaned Somali immigrants in the United States as “garbage” — sparking an outcry both at home and abroad.

Earlier, Trump told reporters he did not care about the prize, but noted that he had “settled eight wars” in his 10 months in office.

“I don’t need prizes. I need to save lives,” Trump said. “I saved millions and millions of lives, and that’s really what I want to do.”

Karachi Blues outclassed defending champions Sialkot by a massive 218 runs in the final of the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy, sealing their 22nd title at the Gaddafi Stadium on Friday evening.

Karachi lifted the trophy along with a prize purse of Rs7.5 million, while Sialkot received Rs4m as runners-up.

Abdullah Fazal, named Player of the Final, earned a Rs100,000 award, while Ali Usman (best bowler) and Saad Baig — who swept the honours for best batter, best wicket-keeper and Player of the Tournament — received Rs250,000 each.

Sialkot, chasing an improbable 533 for victory, resumed the final day on 12 without loss and were dismissed for 314 in 71.1 overs. Though Afzaal Manzoor, Abdullah Shafique, and Hamza Nazar registered half-centuries, Karachi’s pace spearhead Saqib Khan delivered another decisive spell to secure the title for Saud Shakeel’s side.

Saqib, who claimed his third five-for of the tournament and finished with 47 wickets overall — just one behind leading wicket-taker Ali Usman (48) — struck early on day five, ending a 35-run opening stand between Mohammad Hurraira (39 off 65, five fours) and Azan Awais (11 off 18).

Abdullah Shafique (58 off 98, six fours and a six) added partnerships of 46 with Hurraira and 40 with Abdul Rehman (18 off 22, three fours), but Karachi continued to chip away, reducing Sialkot to 144-5 in 38.2 overs.

From there, Afzaal (63 off 48, 13 fours) and Hamza (56 off 84, nine fours) staged resistance, combining for a 112-run sixth-wicket stand off 107 balls.

But Rameez Aziz broke through in the 57th over, triggering a collapse in which Sialkot lost their last five wickets for 58 runs.

Saqib finished with match figures of 9-165 from 44 overs, while Mushtaq Ahmed and Rameez Aziz picked up two wickets apiece.