{"id":25920,"date":"2026-06-23T04:53:12","date_gmt":"2026-06-23T04:53:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/2026\/06\/23\/france-iraq-world-cup-game-suspended-due-to-severe-weather-alert-france-24\/"},"modified":"2026-06-23T04:53:12","modified_gmt":"2026-06-23T04:53:12","slug":"france-iraq-world-cup-game-suspended-due-to-severe-weather-alert-france-24","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/2026\/06\/23\/france-iraq-world-cup-game-suspended-due-to-severe-weather-alert-france-24\/","title":{"rendered":"France-Iraq World Cup game suspended due to severe weather alert &#8211; France 24"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Headings<br \/>                     <span class=\"t-location\">Philadelphia (AFP) \u2013 <\/span>                    The World Cup match between France and Iraq on Monday restarted after a severe weather alert led to the half-time interval lasting over two hours.                <br \/><span class=\"m-pub-dates__date\">Issued on: <time datetime=\"2026-06-22T22:19:10+00:00\" pubdate=\"pubdate\">23\/06\/2026 &#8211; 00:19<\/time><\/span><span class=\"m-pub-dates__date\">Modified: <time datetime=\"2026-06-23T00:08:18+00:00\">23\/06\/2026 &#8211; 02:08<\/time><\/span><br \/>The game in Philadelphia, which kicked off at 5:00 pm local time (2100 GMT), was halted at half-time as a huge storm passed over the city and didn&#8217;t resume for more than two hours.<br \/>The match kicked off in dry conditions before torrential ain began to fall late in the first half, and supporters were told as soon as the half-time whistle was blown to &#8220;exit the open seating area and seek shelter in covered areas of the stadium&#8221;.<br \/>The vast majority of the 68,324-capacity Lincoln Financial Field, renamed Philadelphia Stadium for the tournament, is uncovered &#8212; leaving most of the capacity crowd to pack into the concourses.<br \/>The second half eventually got under way at 8:00 pm local time, more than two hours behind schedule, after the pitch had been cleared of standing water.<br \/>It is the first match of this World Cup to be delayed by the threat of severe weather, with strict protocols in place in the United States when a storm is detected in the surrounding area.<br \/>France were leading 1-0 at half-time in the Group I contest thanks to a Kylian Mbappe goal in the 14th minute.<br \/>&#8220;We brought the ponchos, we were ready,&#8221; said Steven Jouan, 32, who had come to Philadelphia from South Carolina with his partner for the game to support France.<br \/>&#8220;We have been to different sporting events before so we knew that delays happen. Most of the other games get cancelled but a World Cup game, you just gotta stick it out.&#8221;<br \/>Several games at last year&#8217;s Club World Cup in the US were held up because of bad weather &#8212; in the most extreme example, the last-16 match between Chelsea and Benfica in Charlotte was stopped for almost three hours late in normal time.<br \/>\u00a9 2026 AFP<br \/><span class=\"a-section-color\"><\/span><span class=\"a-section-title__label\">Today&#039;s top stories<\/span><br \/><span class=\"a-section-color\"><\/span><span class=\"a-section-title__label\">Most read<\/span><br \/>             \u00a9 2026 Copyright France 24 &#8211; All rights reserved. France 24 is not responsible for the content of external websites. Audience ratings certified by ACPM.<a href=\"https:\/\/www.acpm.fr\/Support-Numerique\/site\/france24-com\" class=\"a-brand-logo a-svg a-svg--logo-acpm\" hreflang=\"fr\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\" title=\"ACPM\" lang=\"fr\">    ACPM<\/a>         <br \/>The content you requested does not exist or is not available anymore.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/news.google.com\/rss\/articles\/CBMisAFBVV95cUxPUWJvdzR6RGNlVUk5ZEd3RHlJS2lZdE9DalJxQ2JqeEdRdTJuWUlxaFhDcjF2aURqWWlWNV9Xb1IyTS00dnJlOURGX3pWN1JqTk1pY1Y5SkxWSi0xTjFwNzhPd0ZzZi1MM2lRX1Q5aXFxc0tlR2l4andGbmMya2JleXJlcHdzLThCeWF1a2swY2xfQVA2NmZaS25oV3pCeDNZZHN0dDNHVDdVZVFZc2lTRQ?oc=5\">source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Headings Philadelphia (AFP) \u2013 The World Cup match between France and Iraq on Monday restarted after a severe weather alert led to the half-time interval lasting over two hours. Issued on: 23\/06\/2026 &#8211; 00:19Modified: 23\/06\/2026 &#8211; 02:08The game in Philadelphia, which kicked off at 5:00 pm local time (2100 GMT), was halted at half-time as [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":25921,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-25920","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25920","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25920"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25920\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25921"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25920"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25920"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25920"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}