The District has been passed over as a host city for the 2026 World Cup.

FIFA officials announced the 16 winning cities in the U.S., Mexico and Canada that will host the championships,during a live-streamed event on Thursday evening. But soccer fans in the D.C. area will have to hop on Amtrak or I-95 and head to Philadelphia or New York to attend to a game; D.C. and Baltimore’s combined bid was not among the locations selected for the 2026 event.

Others that did make the cut are: Seattle, the San Francisco Bay Area, Los Angeles, Kansas City, Missouri; Dallas, Houston, Atlanta, Boston, Miami, in the U.S.; Guadalajara, Monterrey, and Mexico City, in Mexico; and Vancouver and Toronto in Canada.

“We will have millions of people coming and five or six billion people around the world tuning in and watching. It will create something incredible for this part of the world,” said FIFA President Gianni Infantino.

FIFA officials did not release any details about how many matches each city will host or where the World Cup final will be. The competition will feature 48 countries competing, up from 32 in the 2022 World Cup, which is slated for this fall in Qatar.

The host cities were selected from a pool of 22 candidates.

“It was very, very tough of course. All cities have done a fantastic, incredible job, with a great passion, but you have to take decisions,” Infantino said before announcing the host cities.

District leaders pitched D.C. as a “global capital city with deep roots in soccer history,” touting its “world-class infrastructure” and “proven ability to host high-profile, international events.” Officials also pointed to D.C.’s growing soccer scene: the city is home to one of the most successful Major League Soccer teams, D.C. United, and one of the top National Women’s Soccer League team, the Washington Spirit, winner of the 2021 national championship.

Local leaders seemed to be at least relatively optimistic D.C. and Baltimore’s bid made the cut, organizing a watch party at downtown D.C. bar and event venue Penn Social to watch the announcement live. The mood after the reveal didn’t look all that great, at least according to a photo one attendee posted on Twitter.

https://twitter.com/LaRodriguezCJ/status/1537553588284755973

D.C. was originally bidding on its own to host some World Cup matches, but the bid apparently ran into trouble after a visit from FIFA officials, who reportedly expressed concern about the District’s proposal to hold matches at FedEx Field, the Washington Commanders’ aging stadium in Landover. (D.C.’s Audi Field, home to Major League Soccer’s D.C. United, is far too small for World Cup games, seating just 20,000 spectators.)

In April D.C. joined forces with Baltimore in a bid to host the games together. The games in this region would have been held in Baltimore at the newly renovated M&T Bank Stadium, while the District would host a massive watch party on the National Mall.

D.C. hosted the World Cup once before, in 1994. Back then, a match in the round of 16 was held at RFK Memorial Stadium, where the Washington football team played at the time. RFK wasn’t under consideration this time though, as it is headed for demolition. Though the Commanders are in search of a new stadium somewhere in the D.C. area, it will not be built in time for the 2026 cup.

When the U.S. hosted the World Cup in 1994, professional soccer in the country was almost nonexistent, with no national league. When FIFA picked the U.S. to host the games that year, it came with strings attached: the U.S. had to pledge to start a professional soccer league. Now, the U.S. has robust men’s and women’s professional leagues: Major League Soccer was founded in 1993 and has 26 teams, 23 from the U.S. and three from Canada, and the now 10-year-old National Women’s Soccer League has 12 teams.