Courtesy of Texas A&M Athletics
All eyes are on Kyle Field this weekend as Texas A&M University welcomes the Mexican and Brazilian men’s national soccer teams for its first-ever international event.
On Saturday, June 8, Mexico and Brazil will kick off their friendly match at 7:30 p.m. as part of the Mexican national soccer team's annual tour known as MexTour.
Organized by Soccer United Marketing, the Mexican national soccer team has traveled on the MexTour since 2002, playing over 85 games across the United States. In preparation for the 2026 FIFA World Cup, this year consists of a five-city tour across the U.S. against five different national teams — Bolivia in Chicago, Uruguay in Denver, Brazil in College Station, New Zealand in Pasadena, Calif., and Canada in Arlington.
While MexTour has played in the other selected stadiums in past years, Saturday’s game will be the first held at Kyle Field. The College Station addition is part of MexTour’s efforts to choose a new, “unorthodox” location every year, says Gabriel Gabor, MexTour media officer.
“There's a few requirements for picking a market,” Gabriel says. “First of all, it has to be a terrific venue. Secondly, there has to be great places to train for the teams. And thirdly, if you're going to play in a stadium that big, you better have a big rival, and it doesn't get much bigger than Brazil. All the stars are aligned for what is going to be a great event.”
Discussion for this major event began in August 2023 when Major League Soccer reached out to Texas A&M Athletics’ special events team. Originally, there were concerns regarding how producing a soccer game would even be possible, especially with the field specifications that are required, says Kindra Fry, assistant athletics director for special events. After being flown out to Los Angeles in December to watch a MexTour match, Kindra says the events team got an opportunity to see how all the pieces work together and the real conversation started.
“Our football field is not the size of a soccer field,” Kindra says. “Several years earlier, we had some professional soccer groups reach out asking to do soccer matches, [but] I just don't think we thought we had the capacity to do it. We have the best field crew ever, because they're currently making grass grow about two inches high, and it is growing on tarp.”
Since football fields are crowned in the middle while soccer fields are flatter, the field maintenance crew was required to cut into the football field to make it playable for the match. The size of the grass also had to be expanded, which now covers the border for a field size of 115 yards long by 69 yards wide.
“[Kyle Field] has a natural grass field, a world-class field,” Gabriel says. “I think folks will see when they come to the stadium [this] week that, working with the athletics department, we've expanded the grass area on the field. That will be exciting for fans who are used to going to that stadium.”
Both Kindra and Gabriel emphasize that ticket sales are strong, with over 66,000 purchased currently and an expectation of 75,000 by the start of the game. MexTour predicts a large number of walk-up ticket purchases the day of the match — up to 10,000 — due to its location between large cities such as Dallas, Austin, San Antonio and Houston.
“On average, we get fans buying tickets from 30 different states around the U.S.,” Gabriel says. “So fans will fly in or drive hours to have this incredible experience at a world-class level, and then the fact that we're playing Brazil just doubles the excitement.”
Due to the publicity of this international match and the George Strait concert scheduled next week in Kyle Field, the Bryan/College Station community has seen a large economic impact. In order to generate different revenue streams during the slower months outside of football season, the Texas A&M Athletics special events team is working to find new ways to use Kyle Field as an entertainment event center. Kindra says requests to use the stadium as a venue have increased greatly, and that they have the support of the athletic director to move forward.
“I think it is to be expected we're gonna see more of these events in the future,” Kindra says. “We're not going to be able to have an event here and it not go great because of the iconic stature of Kyle Field.”
Tickets can still be purchased at 12thmanfoundation.evenue.net. The match will be covered by major media outlets, including ESPN, Fox Deportes, Televisa, Univision, Telemundo, TV Azteca, Global Brazil, ESPN Brasil and more.
