World Cup 2026: England ready for open-air Miami heat – or does Norway hold the edge?

England’s primary base when coming to the United States was, coincidentally, Florida.

Thomas Tuchel and his team spent 10 days in the area, playing warm-up games against them New Zealand and in Tampa Costa Rica in orlando.

The Three Lions then move to their tournament facility in Kansas, where daily air temperatures hover around 32-34C (90-93F).

Which will help England to handle the heat.

Loughborough University’s Dr Lee Taylor – a leading expert on elite athlete performance and the challenges of heat and altitude – told the BBC that adaptation to sport is crucial.

“It’s the gold standard approach to protecting athlete health and performance,” Taylor said.

“They’ve been getting these exposures in players pretty consistently because they’ve had two hot bases.

“So we’re pretty sure these players are used to it. They haven’t been able to really test it in a game environment, but we’re not too concerned because we know they’ve acquired those physiological adaptations.”

Norway played their two warm-up matches against Sweden and Morocco in cooler weather in Oslo and New Jersey respectively.

They are based in Greensboro, North Carolina, where they are experiencing the same temperatures as the England team.

“Norway played four pretty warm games, and the one in New Jersey was particularly hot,” Taylor said.

“Based on the fatigue that the Norwegian players have achieved, the conditions that England have developed through, I would probably like to see a situation like that.”