SportsCage analyst Arash Madani thinks the Toronto Argonauts should have played the teams home games at the University of Guelph instead of in opposing teams’ stadiums while the 2026 FIFA World Cup is played at BMO Field in the summer.<\/p>\n
“Friday, May 29, they’re playing a preseason home game\u00a0in Guelph. They’re playing regular season home games in Regina against the Riders,\u00a0in Winnipeg against the Bombers. I get the sense we’re gonna be talking about this a lot this season,” Madani said to SportsCage host Barney Shynkaruk.<\/p>\n
“I’m all for the Argos playing in Guelph through all of this. The BC Lions have decided they’re gonna play two games in Kelowna, awesome. You’re the British Columbia Lions<\/a>, let’s do it.”<\/p>\n The World Cup runs from June 11 to July 19 and takes place in stadiums throughout\u00a0the USA, Mexico, and Canada. Toronto and B.C. are the two\u00a0cities\u00a0where Canada will host World Cup games, which meant\u00a0the Argos and the Lions had to make alternate\u00a0arrangements.<\/p>\n That is why Toronto will play in Regina, Winnipeg, and Hamilton as the home team, whereas the Lions will play two home games in Kelowna.\u00a03DownNation.com reporter\u00a0Justin Dunk<\/a>\u00a0asked\u00a0MLSE\u00a0president and CEO Keith Pelley\u00a0why Toronto is playing three away games as the home team in 2026.<\/p>\n \u201cWe did a lot, we spent a lot of time doing research. We looked at every possible option: we looked at Guelph, we looked at Queen\u2019s, we looked at U of T. The best way that we thought to do it next year was to put it in Hamilton and Winnipeg and in Saskatchewan,\u201d Pelley told 3DownNation.com.<\/p>\n \u201cThe reason being is we didn\u2019t want to host a game with 5,000 or 7,000 fans, that was predominantly why we made the decision. We know that we could have probably easily have gotten 7,000 or 10,000 at a game, but we didn\u2019t want to do that and we didn\u2019t think that was great for the brand.\u201d<\/p>\n