The 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup kicks off this week in what is expected to be the biggest sporting event of the summer.
The tournament favorite, the United States Women’s National Team, plays its first game on Friday against Vietnam at 9 p.m. EST.
Here’s everything you need to know about this year’s highly anticipated World Cup:
The tournament started on July 20 and ends on Aug. 20.
The first games took place on Thursday when host nations New Zealand and Australia each won their matches.
See also: The top 5 highest-paid women’s soccer players at the 2023 Women’s World Cup
The 2023 Women’s World Cup is being co-hosted by Australia and New Zealand.
Matches will be held in nine cities including Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide, Perth, Auckland, Wellington, Dunedin and Hamilton. The championship match will be held in Sydney.
The tournament’s location presents a major time difference for viewers in the U.S.
Wellington, New Zealand, is 16 hours ahead of New York, and 19 hours ahead of Los Angeles. And Sydney, Australia, is 14 hours ahead of Eastern Standard Time.
Most of the group stage games will start late at night or early in the morning for east coast viewers.
For U.S. viewers, the World Cup will be broadcast by Fox
FOX,
and games will appear on the flagship Fox channel, Fox Sports 1, as well on Telemundo in Spanish.
Fox is part of nearly all major cable bundles, and cord-cutters can stream the games on YouTubeTV, FuboTV
FUBO,
Hulu + Live TV, and Sling TV.
As noted above, the USWNT plays its first group stage game on Friday, July 21, against Vietnam at 9 p.m. EST.
The U.S. will then compete against the Netherlands on July 26 and Portugal on Aug. 1, and then compete in the knockout stage if they advance.
The U.S. won the 2019 Women’s World Cup in France, after beating the Netherlands in the final, as well as the 2015 World Cup in Canada.
The U.S. has a total of four Women’s World Cup titles, the most of any nation in the world, while the U.S. men’s team has never won the World Cup.
There have only been eight Women’s World Cups in history with the first tournament occurring in 1991, while the men’s version of the tournament first started in 1930.
Only four countries have won the women’s tournament: the U.S., Germany, Norway and Japan.
Below are the betting odds for the 2023 World Cup from DraftKings
DKNG,
Sportsbook prior to the start of the tournament:
For those not familiar with oddsmaking, a “+” symbol indicates an underdog. For example, a $100 bet placed on a +450 side would net a $450 profit, in addition to getting back your original $100.
The 2023 Women’s World Cup has $150 million in prize money, up 300% from the $30 million in total given out in 2019.
While a significant increase, the amount is still much lower than the $440 doled out at the 2022 men’s tournament in Qatar. FIFA, which organizes the World Cup, said it’s an “objective” to achieve pay parity between the men’s and women’s tournaments by 2027.
Below are the player and nation financial allocations for the 2023 Women’s World Cup:
Each player is guaranteed $30,00 for participating in the tournament, up from $14,000 in 2019.
That’s significant for many of the players, who in some cases don’t have club teams that pay salaries, are semi-pros or even amateurs.
As stated above, pay equity for tournament prizes is not the same for World Cup winners between the men and women’s tournaments, but what about in the U.S.?
U.S. women soccer players last year reached a landmark agreement with the sport’s American governing body to end a six-year legal battle over equal pay, a deal in which they are promised $24 million plus bonuses that match those of the men.
The U.S. Soccer Federation and the women announced a deal that will have players split $22 million, about one-third of what they had sought in damages. The USSF also agreed to establish a fund with $2 million to benefit the players in their post-soccer careers and charitable efforts aimed at growing the sport for women.
The USWNT routinely advocated for pay parity during tournament appearances over the past decade.
In addition to equal pay, high-profile players on the USWNT like Megan Rapinoe, Alex Morgan and Carli Lloyd, among many others, have publicly opposed forms of discrimination off the soccer field. These causes include advocating for gender rights, LGBTQ+ rights, voting rights and the Black Lives Matter movement.
After a month of stiff competition in Qatar, the 2022 World Cup’s final matchup is finally set.
Argentina learned Wednesday that defending World Cup winner France will be its opponent in the final on Sunday. France topped a history-making Morocco side 2-0 a day after Argentina shut out Croatia, which lost to France in the 2018 final, a day earlier. Croatia and Morocco square off for third place in the tournament.
Argentina and France, led by Lionel Messi and Kylian Mbappé, respectively, were two among a handful of favorites heading into the quadrennial footballing spectacle.
Here’s what you need to know ahead of the World Cup final.
The tournament title match will be played Sunday, Dec. 18, at 10 a.m. Eastern time. That’s 6 p.m. in Qatar, earlier than the tournament matches have typically been played.
The World Cup final can be watched in the U.S. on Fox
FOX,
FOXA,
and Telemundo, owned by Comcast
CMCSA,
unit NBCUniversal. Fox is available through nearly all cable providers, and cord cutters can stream the match live through FuboTV FUBO, SlingTV, the Alphabet-owned
GOOG,
GOOGL,
YouTubeTV and Comcast’s Peacock.
Both teams have been oddsmakers’ favorite in every one of their 2022 World Cup matches leading up to the final. But for the grand finale, France is seen a slight favorite over Argentina. France is +175 to win, which carries an implied probability of 36.4%, while the Argentina team is being given a 35.1% chance to win, according to the implied-probability data taken from DraftKings’
DKNG,
odds on Wednesday. The outstanding percentage would account for a draw, though all matches beginning in the knockout stage go to a penalty shootout if a score is tied at the end of regulation and at the end of two 15-minute halves of overtime.
A win for France would mean back-to-back men’s World Cup wins for the European nation, and France’s third title in history.
Likewise, a win for Argentina would mean its third World Cup title, and the first World Cup win for legend of the game Messi.
Related: Budweiser says it will award unconsumed Qatar beer to the World Cup winner
A record-breaking amount of prize money will also be at stake. FIFA has allocated $440 million in prize money this year, up from $400 million for the 2018 World Cup, hosted by Russia. (FIFA announced on the same day in December 2010 its selection of Russia and Qatar to host the global game’s marquee event in 2018 and 2022, respectively.)
This year’s winning side will get $42 million, up $4 million from the 2018 tournament.
The runner-up will receive $30 million, and the third- and fourth-place teams are going home with $27 million and $25 million. As for the rest, the teams that lost in the quarterfinals will each receive $17 million; teams that lost in the second round will get $13 million each; and teams knocked out in the group stage (including the U.S.) will get $9 million each. All 32 qualifying teams also received $1.5 million for securing their spots in the tournament. Only Qatar, as the host country, did not have to play its way in through regional competition.
Messi, playing in his fifth career World Cup, has said that this would probably be the last time he plays in the competition.
Failing over the years to achieve in international competition for Argentina what he has in club play (save an appearance in the 2014 final against Germany and a Copa America title in 2021), chiefly with Barcelona in Spain and now with Paris Saint-Germain in France, where he and Mbappé are teammates, Messi has previously announced and rescinded an intent to step back as an international. Only now he’s 35.
From the archives (January 2010): Club or country? Soccer World Cup revives old tensions
“Yes. Surely, yes,” Messi said when asked whether Sunday’s game will be his last at a World Cup. “There’s a lot of years until the next one, and I don’t think I have it in me, and finishing like this is best.”