Netflix Scores Big With Soccer Icon’s Football Show for the 2026 FIFA World Cup

Netflix is getting its World Cup game plan in early: Gary Lineker is taking his podcast to the streamer for 2026. If you want wall-to-wall match talk from a former Tottenham and Barcelona striker who basically lives for this stuff, you just found your daily show.

What Netflix is actually doing here

Per Deadline, Lineker will bring his podcast 'The Rest Is Football' to Netflix for the 2026 FIFA World Cup, running a daily version throughout the tournament. He will be joined by the usual partners in crime: Premier League record-scorer Alan Shearer and former Manchester City defender Micah Richards. Because a big chunk of the tournament is in the U.S., the trio will set up shop in a New York studio for the duration.

"We can't wait to bring The Rest Is Football to Netflix for the 2026 World Cup. It's a fantastic opportunity for the three of us to do what we love, talk football every day, but on a truly global stage. Expect all the usual analysis, honesty, and plenty of laughs... just with a few more cameras pointed at us, all from the Big Apple."

The plan, at a glance

• Daily episodes during the 2026 FIFA World Cup, hosted by Gary Lineker with Alan Shearer and Micah Richards
• Recorded from a New York studio for the length of the tournament
• Focused on analysis and reaction to every game, not live match footage
• Distributed on Netflix worldwide, leveraging the show's existing audience

Important fine print

This is a talk show, not a broadcast. Netflix doesn't have World Cup match rights, so the podcast won't show game footage. In the U.S., Fox holds the live rights. In the U.K., it's BBC and ITV. Netflix is handling the conversation around the matches, not the matches themselves. Honestly, a smart way to be in the mix without paying those eye-watering rights fees.

Why Lineker makes sense for this

Lineker isn't just a familiar face; he's a former England star and 1986 Ballon d'Or runner-up who has built a second career as a sharp, straight-talking pundit. The podcast itself comes from Goalhanger and pulls in more than 7 million monthly streams. It already test-drove this kind of partnership with DAZN during the 2025 Club World Cup, so moving the World Cup edition to Netflix feels like scaling up the same playbook.

When all this goes down

The 2026 FIFA World Cup is being hosted across the U.S., Canada, and Mexico. It kicks off on June 11, 2026, and wraps with the final on July 19, 2026. Expect the pod to be a daily staple all the way through.