“I mean, it wasn’t going to be in Chicago, right?”
I would think it might have (do they have an MLS team?). When the US hosted in 1994, they played games in Giants Stadium here in NJ, as well as several other locations (Florida, California). You need to have a good number of stadiums to host it, and we were decent candidates because many will need to build stadiums if selected, while we already have (and use) them. The best thing about the US hosting in 1994 was that every team had natives living here to support their teams. That being said, I don’t think the sport will ever thrive here, and I’d watch regardless of where they play. Having them play in Qatar will probably allow Americans to watch many games that they may have otherwise missed due to work, etc.
Didn’t FIFA have to modify the rules for World Cup soccer to allow the games to be played on smaller fields in some of the U.S. venues in 1994? I seem to remember Giants Stadium being a very tight fit for a soccer field — especially in the corners.