FIFA's Oscar Sanchez on the Task of Producing a North American World Cup The head of host broadcast production spoke during SVG Europe's Football Summit last month By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director Thursday, April 17, 2025 - 10:45 am
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There are just 420 days until the 2026 FIFA World Cup kicks off in the U.S. and one of the most significant sports events in this nation's lifetime will be underway.
Plenty of preparations are left to be done, and, for FIFA, broadcasting the event over the massive footprint of North America is a significant challenge. One that is being tackled by FIFA Head of Host Broadcast Production Oscar Sanchez.
In this wide-ranging interview with SVG Executive Director, Editorial, Ken Kerschbaumer, Sanchez talks about his career so far, shares his views on the industry's current production challenges, and divulges some of the lessons learned from his time working at CONCACAF and on the FIFA World Cup. The conversation also explores the increasingly pressing issue of developing next-generation talent.
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Here's more on the conversation from SVG Europe Content Editor Jo Ruddock:
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 on March 20.
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 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 guaranteed, 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. 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 U.S. in June and July, and the 2026 World Cup, which will be hosted by Canada, Mexico, and the U.S.
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 onsite. 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 organization, that we're serving correctly those who are buying our rights.
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