Live updates: Fans stream into Toronto as Canada begins its 2026 World Cup campaign against Bosnia-Herzegovina

Canada’s men ready for historic match against Bosnia-Herzegovina

For the first time in their program’s hardscrabble history, Canada’s men will play in a FIFA World Cup here at home, beginning with this afternoon’s all-important opener against Bosnia-Herzegovina.

For the players, kickoff will come as a relief — and a release. It’s as though they’ve been actors waiting backstage while their theatre is being built around them. (In Toronto, that’s literally true: BMO Field — renamed Toronto Stadium for the tournament — has gone from 28,000 seats to nearly 46,000 in amazingly short order, a cottage by the lake turned into a fortress.)

“I just want to get started,” midfielder Ismaël Koné, who’s returned to training after he spiked a fever on Wednesday, said earlier this week. “We’ve been practising and pushing and speaking about tactics, speaking about the opposite team, speaking about ourselves, speaking about the moment.… The moment is now.”

Canada, having never won a game in its two previous men’s World Cup appearances, finds itself today under the unfamiliar weight of expectation. If Marsch’s men don’t advance out of their group — they’ll also face Qatar and Switzerland in Vancouver — they will be considered disappointments, even failures.

Four points should be enough to get through. They will probably beat Qatar. They will probably suffer against the Swiss. That makes today’s opener the likely decider, in a nervous-making way. The beginning feels like a potential ending.

Kickoff is set for 3 p.m. ET.