Football Summit 2025: FIFA's Oscar Sanchez talks career progression, World Cup preparations and more By Jo Ruddock
Friday, March 21, 2025 - 08:05
Print This Story
From being in front of the camera hosting entertainment shows in his native Costa Rica, to spending more than a decade at Concacaf, latterly as director broadcast operations, EP and media distribution, Oscar Sanchez's path to his current role at FIFA has certainly been varied. But this variety provided essential experiences and learnings that are relevant to his current role as head of broadcast production, he told the audience at Football Summit yesterday (20 March).
I was at Concacaf for 14 years and it was a great experience, he said. Moving to FIFA, I think I have an advantage, because having worked at Concacaf before you understand how a sports league or sports federation works, which is very important. Then the other part is you become scrappy. Scrappy for some is a word that doesn't have positive connotations, but to me, it's very good, because you learn how to do things with less resources. For instance, I'm not ashamed to say I have lost two games in my life that went black completely. One was because the uplink truck never made it to Guatemala, so we were not able to make it to America. I said at that time, this is the last time that happens to me. So we started doing IP, very early, in 2017. When it worked and the team in Miami could see the signal, it was like magic to me.
Given that much of Sanchez's work took place in parts of the Caribbean and the Americas where connectivity could not be guranateed, this approach raised some eyebrows.
People said to me, you're crazy - in all those beautiful islands that people go to for vacations, but never for work, you're never going to be able to find connectivity'. Last year, we did over 200 games with IP, using everything from TVU and LiveU to Haivision, whatever was available. And we had fewer issues than we had with satellite, particularly when it came to transporting kit between islands. So I learned a lot..
For Sanchez two major events are currently consuming much of his time, the first Club World Cup, set to take place in the US in June and July, and the 2026 World Cup, which will be hosted by Canada, Mexico and the US.
The Club World Cup 2025 is massive. It's 64 games in a very short time across 12 venues in the United States. It's very big, not only in terms of the production that we're putting together, but also in terms of the passion that the fans are going to show. It's less than three months away and we're excited to be showing that to the world.
In terms of the production setup, FIFA is opting for a traditional approach. There will be 11 production teams one based in each city (two stadiums in Orlando are being used), he explained. Then we are going to have an IBCC a smaller version of an IBC at MetLife Stadium in New York, with a more limited presence of media partners on site. From there we'll create and distribute the world feed and make sure that everyone gets that. We're also testing a couple of things related to 2026.
About the World Cup, Sanchez said 2025 is massive, but 2026 is humongous. it's 16 venues, 104 games and there won't be a day without a game until 27 days after the beginning of the tournament. We're going to have our IBC at Dallas. It's a fantastic place, and we're excited to be there. We're going to have 60 production crews based in each city, we're not going to be moving them around, but the replay operations and camera shading are being done from the IBC, so we're working a very complex setup. It's going to be an interesting one, because it demands a lot of from the people and it demands a lot from the suppliers that we're working with and engaging with. The USA, Mexico and Canada are very different, very diverse, and you need to plan now to be ready to deliver what you need to deliver.
After six months with FIFA, Sanchez continues to learn: I think one of the things that I have found here is that this is a service position. I would love to say that I'm creative, that I can tell any of the directors what they need to do, but I don't do that. My position is to make sure, just like the rest of the philosophy of the organisation, that we're serving correctly those who are buying our rights.
Most recent headlines
24/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
24/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
24/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
24/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
24/12/2025
Scripps Research study links sleep variability with sleep apnea and hypertension How consumers' digital activity trackers could enable personalized health s...
23/12/2025
How guilas Cibae as Dominican Winter League Games Are Locally Produced for Glob...
23/12/2025
BitFire's Jim Akimchuk on Supplying Scalability and Customization in the Clo...
23/12/2025
CAMB.AI Enables European Athletics to Offer Multi-Language SupportPlan is to eventually offer translation into all languages spoken in EuropeBy Ken Kerschbaumer...
23/12/2025
Analysis: As sports media values trend negative, scarcity and quality are king By Callum McCarthy, Editor-at-Large
Monday, December 22, 2025 - 14:08
Print ...
23/12/2025
ESPN, Disney, and NBA Return to the Animated Altcast Fray With Second Edition of...
23/12/2025
End the Year on a High Note and Donate to the Sports Broadcasting Fund Today! By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director
Tuesday, December 23, 2025 - 12:25 pm
...
23/12/2025
The year is winding down, the weather outside is frightful, and it's the perfect time to escape into a story that warms the heart. For listeners looking for...
23/12/2025
A Zeus motor is hot fire tested at L3Harris' Camden, Arkansas, solid rocket ...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Lightware will exhibit several major product innovations at ISE 2026, including the new USB-C BOOSTER-V1, Google Meet. integration for various Taurus UCX models...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Taking the Stage at Carnegie Hall-On a Global Scale Boston Conservatory Orchestra students reflect on their epic concert marking the 80th session of the UN Gene...
23/12/2025
Experience the power of WO Automation for Radio's newest service, the System Effectiveness Review. Designed to help you achieve more, a System Effectiveness...
23/12/2025
23 Dec 2025
VEON's Beeline Kazakhstan and Rakuten Symphony Collaborate to A...
23/12/2025
Back to All News
How Steamy Can It Get? Single's Inferno' Season 5 Pre...
23/12/2025
Back to All News
33 Million Global Viewers on Netflix Watched Jake Paul vs. Ant...
23/12/2025
New technique lights up where drugs go in the body, cell by cell Scripps Research scientists developed a technique that maps drug binding in individual cells th...
22/12/2025
SVG New Sponsor Spotlight: Presidio's Neerav Shah on the Role of Its Captiva...
22/12/2025
Hitting the bullseye: Sky Sports readies itself for the biggest PDC World Darts ...
22/12/2025
Unique skillset: Bringing new directors to the world of darts at The Worlds with...
22/12/2025
Gravity Media prepares for a flight of fancy with the PDC World Darts Championsh...
22/12/2025
One hundred and eighty: Gravity Media on hitting the production bullseye at the ...
22/12/2025
The Famous Group's Jon Slusser on Fascinating Fans Through Immersive Content...
22/12/2025
ESPN's Meg Aronowitz on Continuing High-Quality Broadcasts of Collegiate Spo...
22/12/2025
ESPN Takes Data-Driven Storytelling to New Heights with MNF Playbook with Next ...
22/12/2025
For a decade, popular German podcast Fest & Flauschig has hosted an annual Chris...
22/12/2025
Paramount Scores Largest Share Increase Among Distributors as Paramount and CBS...
22/12/2025
New multi-year deal integrates Roku's data to fuel Nielsen's measurement suite
Roku gains access to Nielsen's streaming ratings, showing The Roku C...
22/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
22/12/2025
Berklee Wrapped 2025: Our Top News and Stories A look back at a year highlighted by faculty milestones, major film and television projects, Bob Dylan's ho...
22/12/2025
The works of Plato state that when humans have an experience, some level of change occurs in their brain, which is powered by memory - specifically long-term me...
22/12/2025
Partnership integrates complementary satellite data and AI analytics to enhance security, infrastructure, and environmental monitoring solutions for global cust...
22/12/2025
Workflows allow you to create a sequence of planned events which may be added to your template(s) or inserted directly into your sequential or background playli...
22/12/2025
Monday 22 December 2025
Sky extends PGA TOUR partnership until 2029, as Sky Spo...
22/12/2025
Back to All News
Global Anime Hits and New Releases Take Center Stage at Jump Festa 2026
Entertainment
22 December 2025
GlobalJapan
Link copied to clipboar...
22/12/2025
Siobh n McSweeney, Rory McIlroy, Elon Musk, Catherine Connolly, Jim Gavin, Ivan Yates and Traitor Paudie Moloney lead new characters for Callan Kicks the Year 2...
22/12/2025
Winner announced in the picturesque surroundings of Wicklow's Avondale Tower and Treetop Walk
Andrew Trimble wins the show in his first series as coach
Th...
22/12/2025
The 2025 winners have been announced today, Sunday 21 December, for Ireland's largest choral competition Choirs for Christmas hosted by RT lyric fm.
Ove...
21/12/2025
Back to All News
Legoshi and Haru's Story Reaches Its Finale: BEASTARS Fin...
Football Summit 2025: FIFA's Oscar Sanchez talks career progression, World Cup preparations and more By Jo Ruddock 
