Mexico hosted the 1970 FIFA World Cup. It was a great event that saw Brazil claiming their third trophy in history. All the FIFA World Cup are available to place wagers on at the www.1xbet.com/en/ website when they take place.
Later, West Germany, Argentina and Spain did the same with the 1974, 1978 and 1982 editions respectively. Later, the 1986 edition was organized again by Mexico. It is quite unusual for a single country to organize two FIFA World Cups with only 16 years in between. However, the truth is that Mexico was not the original organizer of this competition. Whenever wanting to wager on these spectacular football tournaments, you can do so at the 1xBet platform.
Early plans
Normally, a FIFA World Cup is awarded between 6-8 years prior to the competition itself. However, in the case of the 1986 edition, this happened much earlier. Colombia was the only country that submitted a bid to host this championship. You can make a bet football online on 1xbet.com/en/line/Football/, which features all matches from Colombian football.
Since no other country submitted any other bid in order to organize the tournament, in 1974, 12 years before the cup, it was awarded to Colombia. This was huge news for the South American nation, who really wanted to have an amazing championship of their own. For betting on these FIFA competitions, you can make an online football wager on the 1xBet site.
Problems and last minute changes
In 1974, when the competition was awarded to Colombia, the competition had only 16 teams. Regardless of the format, the 1xbet.com/en/live/ website allows wagers on everything surrounding this incredible championship.
Before the 1982 tournament organized by Spain, it was decided that from that competition onwards, the cup would be expanded to 24 teams. Spain didn’t have any problem in hosting this expanded edition of the tournament, and the 1982 cup went without issues.
But, this created major issues for Colombia. The host argued that they agreed to a 16-team tournament, and completely disagreed with a 24-team cup. They claimed they couldn’t afford a 24-team competition.
There were some negotiations, including the chance to scale down the cup to 16 teams again. However, in 1982, Colombia officially announced their decision of resigning as the hosts of the 1986 cup.
As a consequence, a new bidding process began. This time, three countries showed interest:
- Mexico;
- the United States;
- and Canada.
Mexico was chosen as the new host of the competition. Curiously, those three countries together would host the same competition 40 years later, in 2026. The 1xBet website has football matches from Mexico, Canada and the United States.