Football. Heat. Phoenix Rising.
Pledgeball’s new docuseries Route ’26 heads into the heart of this summer's tournament.
The 2026 FIFA World Cup is set to be the biggest tournament football has ever seen. But as temperatures soar across North America, a major new documentary series from Pledgeball is asking a difficult question:
Can football cope with the heat?
Route ’26: Losing Sight of the Goal is a bold new football road-trip series from Pledgeball that follows football YouTube royalty Laurence McKenna and creator Alex Moneypenny across the United States, Canada and Mexico as they uncover the climate challenges already threatening the future of the game.
Part documentary, part football adventure and part climate investigation, the series dives into the real-world conditions awaiting fans and players at the 2026 World Cup.
The episode paints a vivid picture of what millions of supporters could face at the 2026 World Cup – not as an abstract climate projection, but as a lived football experience happening right now.
Route ’26 has been designed to engage football fans beyond the traditional climate audience, using storytelling, humour and football culture to explore some of the biggest environmental questions surrounding the tournament.
Across the series, Laurence and Alex investigate sustainability, travel, infrastructure and the growing impact of climate change on communities across North America.
Watch Episode 1:
The upcoming Episode 2 (released on YouTube on Thursday 11th at 4pm) takes viewers to Phoenix, Arizona, where Laurence and Alex witness the reality of football in extreme temperatures.
From travelling deep into the Arizona desert to attending a Phoenix Rising match played in blistering 42°C heat, the episode captures just how intense conditions could become during the tournament.
Alongside the on-the-ground experience, the pair speak to a local expert about how severe heat impacts the human body and why extreme temperatures are becoming one of the defining issues facing global sport.
Alex Moneypenny, Content CreatorOn attending a Phoenix Rising game where temperatures remained around 39°C even at 7pm. “It [felt] like being in an oven. People think it’s just a bit warmer. It’s not. It’s the dryness of the heat.”
“We’d had a kickabout earlier in the trip and after a couple of sprints my mouth was completely dry. I was drinking water constantly.”
“If the World Cup is played in that sort of heat, there’s almost no point having conversations about anything else. The tactical conversations, the line-ups, all of it becomes secondary because that’s what you’re battling against.”
Watch Episode 2 Trailer
Katie Cross, CEO of Pledgeball: “This summer’s tournament feels like a festival in the middle of a pandemic, one that is sponsored by a virus.
The contrast between the exorbitance and environmental impacts of the tournament and the very real ways in which Americans and grassroots players are experiencing climate change, through wildfires, threats to food supplies and drought, are brought to life through the docuseries.”
With anticipation building ahead of the 2026 World Cup, Route ’26 aims to spark conversation about the future of football in a warming world – and whether the sport is prepared for what lies ahead.
For more information on what the tournament will look like for fans this summer, listen to the Pledgeball Podcast, with the Football Supporters’ Association and heat expert Dr Maddy Orr.
For Media Briefing Pack on the World Cup, produced by Cool Down The Sport for Climate Action Network and Pledgeball.
About Pledgeball
Pledgeball are a fan-led BBC Award-winning charity that mobilise the football community to tackle climate change and protect where we play.
About Laurence McKenna
Laurence McKenna is a football presenter, journalist and podcast host with more than 250,000 followers across social media platforms. He has collaborated with Sky Sports, BBC Sport, the Premier League and COP26, among others.
About Alex Moneypenny
Alex Moneypenny is a rising writer, presenter and football podcaster with over 250,000 followers across all platforms. Alongside regular appearances on Sky Sports, written columns for The Metro and appearances on BBC Sport, talkSPORT, SPORTbible and more, Alex is best known for ‘The Different Knock’ a popular Arsenal YouTube channel with over 100,000 subscribers. With a background in theatre, Alex has also written ‘THE SHOCKING TRUTH ABOUT FLAT EARTH’ a brand new musical that will debut at Edinburgh Fringe this summer.