World Cup 2026 playoff draw: whoever finds Italy in the semifinals

After the clear loss to Norway (1-4) on the final day of Group I of the 2026 World Cup qualifiers, Italy will be forced to have to go through the playoffs at the end of March to detach the pass for the next rainbow event scheduled in Canada, Mexico and the United States.

The playoffs will be attended by the runners-up of the 12 qualifying rounds plus the top four winners of the 2024-2025 Nations League who did not finish first or second in their qualifying group.

The 12 teams that finished the group in second place will be divided into three brackets based on the November FIFA ranking: the Azzurri, who occupy ninth place in the ranking, are in the first bracket, along with Turkey, Ukraine and Poland. The national team will challenge one of the four fourth-tier teams in the semifinals at home.

The remaining four teams that will end up in the fourth bracket are those ‘repechaged’from among the top winners of the Nations League. Along with Romania and Northern Ireland, the list also features that Sweden that prevented the Azzurri from participating in the 2018 World Cup and North Macedonia that interrupted their path to the 2022 World Cup. Only the certainty of the latter scenario is missing, as the Macedonian selection could still be undermined by Wales. Decisive in this regard are next Tuesday’s matches. Thursday, November 20, then, will come the 1 p.m. draw in Zurich that will make everything official.