{"id":922721,"date":"2026-07-26T22:13:15","date_gmt":"2026-07-27T03:13:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2026\/07\/26\/world-cup-was-waiting-on-us\/"},"modified":"2026-07-26T22:13:15","modified_gmt":"2026-07-27T03:13:15","slug":"world-cup-was-waiting-on-us","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2026\/07\/26\/world-cup-was-waiting-on-us\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cWorld Cup Was Waiting on Us\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Soccer <\/p>\n<p>Sunday turned into a crowded day for motorsports and soccer. While IndyCar raced in Nashville, the FIFA World Cup final was still running on FOX, and that overlap left some fans frustrated when the race coverage was delayed.<\/p>\n<div id=\"player_stn-player__Dybik\">\n<p>Watch What\u2019s Trending Now!<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>Doug Boles said Fox had to juggle two live events at once, and the delay was shaped by both the World Cup and the weather. He said the network stayed with soccer as long as it could before switching back to IndyCar.<\/p>\n<h2>Soccer The IndyCar president praised Fox Sports for handling the situation<\/h2>\n<p>Boles told the <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/DirtyMoMedia\/status\/2080750125765271640\">Gluckcast podcast<\/a>, \u201cFox has been an amazing partner for IndyCar. We\u2019re in the second year of that, and they are helping us figure out how to grow. With the world championship in terms of soccer, we actually had a lightning delay before the game actually ended. Once the game ended, the plan was, 20 minutes after the end of the game, they were going to come to IndyCar.<\/p>\n<p>Well, we had a lightning delay, then we had another lightning delay, and another lightning delay. Fox came back to us and said, \u2018Look, we\u2019re going to stay on World Cup as long as we can stay on World Cup, until we can come back to racing.\u2019 They wanted to come back to what our sport is, and on an oval, our sport is spectacular, and we knew it would be at Nashville. So a lot of you people gave us grief, and they said, \u2018You waited on World Cup\u2019. No, World Cup was waiting on us.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure>\n<div>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" title=\"Soccer\" src=\"https:\/\/image-cdn.essentiallysports.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/USATSI_29148522_168414837_lowres.jpg.jpeg\" alt=\"Soccer IndyCar\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1613\" height=\"1075\"><\/p><figcaption>\n<p>Imago<\/p>\n<p><span tabindex=\"0\" role=\"button\"><svg width=\"14\" height=\"14\" viewBox=\"0 0 14 14\" fill=\"none\" style=\"margin-right:10px\"><g clip-path=\"url(#clip0_410_56530)\"><path d=\"M7.0013 12.8334C10.223 12.8334 12.8346 10.2217 12.8346 7.00008C12.8346 3.77842 10.223 1.16675 7.0013 1.16675C3.77964 1.16675 1.16797 3.77842 1.16797 7.00008C1.16797 10.2217 3.77964 12.8334 7.0013 12.8334Z\" stroke=\"white\" stroke-width=\"1.5\" stroke-linecap=\"round\" stroke-linejoin=\"round\" \/><path d=\"M7 9.33333V7\" stroke=\"white\" stroke-width=\"1.5\" stroke-linecap=\"round\" stroke-linejoin=\"round\" \/><path d=\"M7 4.66675H7.00667\" stroke=\"white\" stroke-width=\"1.5\" stroke-linecap=\"round\" stroke-linejoin=\"round\" \/><\/g><defs><clipPath id=\"clip0_410_56530\"><rect width=\"14\" height=\"14\" fill=\"white\" \/><\/clipPath><\/defs><\/svg><\/span><\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<p>Not a lot of fans were happy about the constant delays. Normally, Fox Sports gets a poor reputation in both IndyCar and NASCAR regarding its coverage of those sports. But Boles defended the media giant, praising how it handled both events. Boles was not just describing a scheduling quirk. He was pushing back on the idea that IndyCar had put the World Cup ahead of its own race, and that is why the title frames it as a move to save face.<\/p>\n<p>Regardless, without nature\u2019s interference, the race would have likely kicked off while the match was going on. As such, Fox Sports and IndyCar did a lot of coordinating so that the match could wrap up before the race began. During all this, IndyCar fans were not thrilled with Fox delaying coverage of the race. Nevertheless, Fox Sports kept delaying <a href=\"https:\/\/www.essentiallysports.com\/nascar-news-ims-releases-breathtaking-footage-of-hundred-year-old-treasures-uncovered-beneath-historic-track\/?utm_medium=website&#038;utm_source=website_internal&#038;utm_campaign=web_link_1\">IndyCar<\/a> coverage until the match finished and then the lightning delay was over. That way, IndyCar fans would not miss a single piece of action. The plan worked because Boles boasted of 2.9 million average viewership on that Sunday night.<\/p>\n<h2>Soccer Was NASCAR similarly affected by the World Cup final?<\/h2>\n<p>Meanwhile, at North Wilkesboro, there was no such interference from the weather gods. Fortunately for NASCAR fans, they had a better solution, as the start time was much later and would kick off long after the match. The WC Final match started about four hours before the Window World 450 race, so there was plenty of time for it to wrap up. That was all despite the match going into extra time and getting close to a penalty shootout.<\/p>\n<p>Mercifully for NASCAR fans, Ferran Torres scored and ensured that a penalty shootout was avoided. Thus, NASCAR fans have plenty of time to build up to the Cup race at North Wilkesboro, which Joey Logano eventually won.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.essentiallysports.com\/nascar-news-indycar-news-world-cup-was-waiting-on-us-indycar-president-tries-to-save-face-after-nashville-strategy-backlash\/\" class=\"button purchase\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Read More<\/a>Maribel Mote<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Soccer Sunday turned into a crowded day for motorsports and soccer. While IndyCar raced in Nashville, the FIFA World Cup final was still running on FOX, and that overlap left some fans frustrated when the race coverage was delayed. Watch What\u2019s Trending Now! Doug Boles said Fox had to juggle two live events at once, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":922722,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2005,2793,644],"tags":[8783,5489],"class_list":["post-922721","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-soccer","category-waiting","category-world","tag-waiting","tag-world"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/922721","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=922721"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/922721\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/922722"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=922721"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=922721"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=922721"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}