The fixture, part of the Qatar Football Festival, cancelled after alternative dates and venues could not be agreed, UEFA says.<\/p>\n
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Published On 15 Mar 202615 Mar 2026<\/p>\n
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The \u201cFinalissima\u201d match between Spain \u200cand Argentina that was scheduled to be held in Qatar this month has \u2060been cancelled due \u2060to the war in the Middle East, UEFA says.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is a source of great disappointment to UEFA and the organisers that circumstances and timing have denied the teams of the chance to compete for this prestigious prize in Qatar,\u201d UEFA said in a statement on Sunday.<\/p>\n
The US-Israeli strikes on Iran and Iran\u2019s retaliatory strikes on neighbouring nations have affected countries throughout the Gulf, disrupting travel \u2060at some of the world\u2019s busiest transit hubs and cancelling several sporting events due to safety concerns.<\/p>\n
The contest between the European champions Spain and Copa America winners Argentina was \u2060scheduled for March 27 at Doha\u2019s Lusail Stadium, where fans would have had the opportunity to watch Lionel Messi go head-to-head with Lamine Yamal.<\/p>\n
UEFA said they held discussions with organisers in Qatar and concluded that the match could not take place due to the \u201ccurrent political situation\u201d in the \u200cregion.<\/p>\n
The Spain vs Argentina game was part of the Qatar Football Festival. The five-day festival also included Egypt vs Saudi Arabia and Qatar vs Serbia on March 26, Egypt vs Spain and Saudi Arabia vs Serbia on March 30 and Qatar vs Argentina on March 31.<\/p>\n
Serbia will now play Spain away instead.<\/p>\n
\u201cSerbia will face the current European champions, Spain, on away turf on March 27, and four \u2060days later they will host the Saudi Arabian national team,\u201d the \u2060Football Association of Serbia said in a statement.<\/p>\n
The local organising committee of the festival said the decision was taken due to \u201cairspace disruption and travel restrictions\u201d, which would affect the ability of many fans, players and officials to travel.<\/p>\n
It said all fans who purchased tickets for the festival would automatically receive full refunds.<\/p>\n
UEFA said it explored alternatives to play the Finalissima but they proved to be \u201cunacceptable\u201d to the Argentinian Football Association (AFA).<\/p>\n
UEFA first offered to stage the match \u2060at the Santiago Bernabeu with a 50-50 split of supporters in the stadium.<\/p>\n
A second option was to stage the Finalissima over two legs \u2013 \u2060at the Bernabeu on March 27 and the second leg \u2060in Buenos Aires during an international window before the next Euros and Copa America.<\/p>\n
The AFA rejected both options. UEFA said Argentina made a counteroffer to play the game after the World Cup but Spain had no available dates.<\/p>\n
\u201cUltimately, \u200cUEFA sought a commitment from Argentina that, if a neutral venue in Europe could be found, the game could go ahead on 27 March \u2026 or on the alternative date of 30 \u200cMarch. \u200cThis proposal was also rejected,\u201d UEFA added.<\/p>\n
The 2022 edition of the Finalissima was held at Wembley Stadium in London, where Argentina beat Italy 3-0.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The fixture, part of the Qatar Football Festival, cancelled after alternative dates and venues could not be agreed,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":814133,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2026],"tags":[33789,7145,7,62685,13865,88,18468,7146,817,112144],"class_list":{"0":"post-814132","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-football","8":"tag-argentina","9":"tag-europe","10":"tag-football","11":"tag-latin-america","12":"tag-middle-east","13":"tag-news","14":"tag-qatar","15":"tag-spain","16":"tag-sport","17":"tag-us-israel-war-on-iran"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116234809319831177","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/814132","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=814132"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/814132\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/814133"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=814132"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=814132"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=814132"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}