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The 2026 FIFA World Cup will feature custom-made Superior Player of the Match trophies for each of the 104 games in next year’s tournament.
With the help of Michelob Ultra and FIFA, trophy creator Victor Solomon will have his handmade trophies, first revealed on Thursday’s “Fox & Friends,” given to the stars of each match.
“No bulls—, this team and this opportunity has been one of the funnest creative collaborations I’ve ever had,” Solomon said in an interview with Fox News Digital.
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Argentina’s forward Lionel Messi lifts the FIFA World Cup Trophy as he celebrates with supporters winning the Qatar 2022 World Cup final football match between Argentina and France at Lusail Stadium in Lusail, north of Doha on Dec. 18, 2022. (Kirill Kudryavtsev/AFP via Getty Images)
“We’ll have a partner that will come in and say, ‘All right, we have to have this, we have to have this, and this is what we want to look like. Here’s a boat board, a bunch of things that it needs to look like.’ I think with what we had done with the [NBA] championship bottle previously, I think maybe I had a little equity with the team, but Michelob Ultra came up to me and said, ‘whatever you want to do.’ And they really sort of gave me the creative flexibility and freedom to explore what would be a relevant object for this honor.”
Solomon has created numerous trophies in the past, including the Larry O’Brien Trophy given to the NBA champions. For this past NBA Finals, he also designed championship Michelob Ultra bottles that were given to the Oklahoma City Thunder to celebrate with in the locker room.
“I have had the distinct privilege of being a part of such milestones in sports on the basketball side, and I think my partnership with Michelob Ultra was so fun for both sides in reimagining the championship bottle. I think everyone was just kind of like, ‘This was so great, we had such a fun time working together, let’s just run it back. And oh, by the way, it’s going to be on like the biggest, most craziest international stage of all time,’’ Solomon said. “So it’s been a blast working with the team again to consider this honor and think about how we can elevate it for such an exciting moment.”
The trophy features an hourglass shape similar to the World Cup trophy, as well as a 26-degree slope on top to represent the year of the tournament. There are also 104 facets, representing the number of matches in the tournament.
Each “Superior Player of the Match” for all 104 World Cup matches will be awarded this trophy. (Michelob Ultra)
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On, and the slope on top is open, a “narrative point” Solomon wanted to have in the trophy for one very specific reason.
“We’ve heard from every player in every sport, all the players want cups where they can have the moment of being in the locker room and take drinks out of it,” Solomon said.
So, expect some Michelob Ultras to be drunk out of the trophy. But Solomon said that it is a way for the athletes and fans watching at home to have some sort of similarity.
“Guys like you and me, when we’re done with our day, we might crack a Michelob Ultra, that’s our trophy for the day. ‘I f—ing earned this s—. I’m going to unwind a little bit.’ So as we were looking at the formal approach of this trophy, we loved the idea of it being something that had the functionality to be drank out of if someone wanted to go down that road, just to sort of symbolize the parallel between the fans at home that are watching this, and they’re having their own sort of trophy experience with Michelob Ultra and then what Michelob Ultra is owning with their player at the end of the match, they get to crown their achievement too. So that was a very big part of it,” Solomon said.
And just like celebrating with a beer, Solomon recognizes the hard work that comes with it.
2026 FIFA World Cup promotion is displayed at MetLife Stadium after an announcement by FIFA on February 5, 2024, in East Rutherford, New Jersey. (Eduardo MunozAlvarez/VIEW press via Getty Images)
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“When I talk to partners and I talk to leagues, I try to make sure that they understand these guys dedicated their lives in pursuit of this moment,” he said. “The object that represents getting to the mountaintop of this experience needs to be as innovative and creative and thoughtful as the players that are in pursuit of them. So having a partner like Michelob Ultra and FIFA that really understood it had sort of appetite for that story to be told was really an exciting part of this process, too.”
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