- 2 December, 2010 Russia, for the first time in its history, was granted the right to host the FIFA World Cup. The finals of the tournament will be held from June 14 to July 15, 2018.
32 teams will take part in the competition. Russia and 13 national teams would represent European zone (Russia was automatically qualified for the Championship as the host country), five national teams from African zone, and ten from Asia and South America, and three from North American zone. Another two tournament tickets will be decided in play-offs.
The FIFA Cup matches will be held in 11 cities:
Moscow (this city will host the finals of the cup)
Saint Petersburg
Ekaterinburg
Kazan
Samara
Volgograd
Nizhny Novgorod
Saransk
Rostov-on-Don
Kaliningrad
Sochi
From 17 June to 2 July, 2017 Russia will host another FIFA tournament– the Confederations Cup. 8 teams will participate: Russia as a host country of the 2018 FIFA World Cup, Germany as the current world champion, Australia as the winner of the 2015 Asia Cup, Chile as the winner of the 2015 Copa America, Mexica as the winner of play-off match between the winners of the 2013 and 2015 Golden CONCACAF Cup, New Zealand as the winner of the 2016 OFC Nations Cup and Portugal as the current champion of Europe. Another participating country will be determined only on February 5, 2017; it will be the national team who wins the African Cup of Nations.
The matches of Confederation Cup will be held on the stadiums of four cities. Kazan and Sochi will host semi-finals, Spartak Stadium in Moscow will host the semi-final for the third place match, and Saint Petersburg will host the first semi-final and final match of the cup.
In October of 2014 the FIFA unvelined the brand identity of the World Cup and its official emblem, designed in a form of the principal trophy – the world cup. The principal theme of the World Cup Russia is a dream and the cosmic outer space exploration, enlivened with folk motives featuring Firebirds, Matryoshkas and folk patterns.
Wolf Zabivaka™ designed by student Ekaterina Bocharova won the right to be the 2018 World Cup mascot. The main symbol of the tournament was chosen via online voting.
Volunteers will be assisting in the process of managing and hosting the FIFA World Cup and the Confederations Cup. They will receive special training for 20 functional directions. The organizers plan to include over 5 thousand people for hosting the FIFA Confederations Cup 2017 and about 15 thousand people in the 2018 FIFA World Cup. About 20 thousand volunteers will take part in the program entitled City Volunteers.
The 2018 FIFA World Cup and each host city will be represented by elected ambassadors - famous people who were either born in those cities, or are somehow related to them. The ambassadors of the World Cup promote sports and healthy lifestyle and promote the 2018 FIFA World Cup.
Apart from football matches, guests will also be able to visit FIFA Fan Fests - special events organized by FIFA. These are officially dedicated areas to watch Confederations Cup 2017 matches, where everyone unable to come to the stadium is welcome to join the fun. This is the perfect way to safely and conveniently watch live coverage of the games between the best teams in the world.