How Grass Technology Gave USA a Pitch-Perfect Assist In Its Big World Cup Win

LOS ANGELES STADIUM — From the concourse level, the lush green carpet of grass beneath looked immaculate. On whatever screen you watched these first few days of matches at the 2026 FIFA World Cup, the fields appeared equally pristine. Looks can deceive, obviously. The truth would be revealed either way shortly after the tournament co-host U.S. national team kicked off Group D by beating Paraguay on Friday, when I pulled veteran USA defender Antonee “Jedi” Robinson aside, asked him how the surface had played, and waited for his verdict. “We were just talking about this [in the locker room],” Jedi said. “It’s probably the best field I’ve ever played on in the States.” In the eight years since FIFA awarded the 2026 edition of soccer’s quadrennial showpiece to the U.S., Canada and Mexico, what the quality of the pitches might be like has been an unavoidable part of the conversation. Because half of the 16 venues across the three host countries don’t normally house natural grass fields, the global game’s governing body would have to install temporary ones before the 39-day event. Concern that they wouldn’t be of the appropriate standard for the biggest event in sports was understandable. Over the last two summers, players participating in Concacaf’s Gold Cup, CONMEBOL’s Copa América and FIFA’s own Club World Cup — considered a dry run for the main event this June and July — blasted the shoddy turf under their feet with alarming frequency. “Usually, it’s shocking,” Jedi confirmed of those hastily installed versions, which are often laid atop the synthetic gridiron used by NFL teams only days before some of the planet’s most famous athletes compete on them. Players hate it. Fans, too. Why wouldn’t they? Shoddy fields make for bad soccer. “When you can’t tell how the surface is going to react and how the ball will bounce, if it’s sticky, you can’t really play your best football,” Robinson added. “Tonight we could.” That was no happy accident. At Qatar, getting top-level fields ready for the World Cup was comparatively easy. A desert country the size of Connecticut, all 64 matches were played in or around Doha, the capital. They had to get the grass there — it was grown on turf farms in the U.S. and flown to the Middle East — but there were no variations in climate or weather to contend with once it arrived. This World Cup couldn’t be more different. Co-hosted along with Canada and Mexico, the 16 venues are spread across the entire North American continent. There are huge variations in humidity and altitude. Last week’s World Cup opener in Mexico City was played 7,200 feet, while the July 19 final at New York New Jersey stadium will take place at sea level. Five of the stadiums have roofs, the 11 others are open-air. FIFA’s mandate was to get all the fields, no matter where, to perform identically. That process that began almost a decade ago. “Coming from the smallest FIFA World Cup footprint in Qatar in 2022 to the biggest one in 2026,” Alan Ferguson, FIFA’s senior pitch-management manager, said during a Zoom conference with reporters earlier this year, “Presented some unique challenges.” To meet them, FIFA enlisted turf experts — yes, those exist —from Michigan State University and the University of Tennessee — the two leading institutions in the field. (Pun intended.) “We’ve done over 200 projects between the two universities,” said Dr. John Sorokin, a faculty member at Tennessee who, as a student at MSU in 1994, was involved in that year’s installation at the Pontiac Silverdome in suburban Detroit, host of the first indoor World Cup game ever when the U.S. first hosted the event 32 years ago. Advancements in grow-light technology and the universal adoption of “hybrid” fields — natural grass reinforced with synthetic fibers — made it realistic to “provide a consistent, playable surface for every match, where the ball is going to interact with the surface the players running and cutting are going to feel same under their foot,” said Sorokin, who led the undertaking with MSU’s Dr. Trey Rogers, his mentor three decades earlier. There was no one-size-fits-all solution. At the indoor Atlanta Stadium, where the FieldTurf used by the NFL’s Falcons was already scheduled to be replaced before the 2026 season, grounds crews laid natural grass in the winter, ahead Atlanta United’s MLS campaign. FIFA then replaced that pitch with its own in May, using lessons the local groundskeepers learned over the previous months. In Seattle, site of the USA’s second group game on Friday against Australia (kickoff at 3 p.m. ET on FOX/FOX One), FIFA’s field went in more than a month earlier; the Sounders beat Mexican club Tigers on it in Concacaf Champions Cup play on April 15. Miami rolled its turf in on May 27, more than two weeks before Uruguay and Saudi Arabia christen it on Monday night. The goal was to create “something that’s going to be presentable, aesthetically nice on TV, and where the fields are not talked about after the game except for how wonderful it looked,” Sorokin said. There have been zero complaints so far. “I agree with Jedi,” fellow U.S. fullback Alex Freeman said when asked about the field in Los Angeles. “The ball moved pretty fast, and we were able to play our game.” The U.S. strung together 26 consecutive passes before Gio Reyna scored the Stars and Stripes fourth goal in second half stoppage time. That simply wouldn’t have been possible had the grass been sub-par. “It definitely helped, just knowing how the surface is going to play consistently,” Robinson said. “Every time you hit a pass, you knew what the weight was going to be, how fast it was going to go. “It was really good,” he added. “Fair play to whoever set it up.”