TThis is the one thing former FIFA president Sepp Blatter admits he shouldn’t have done: creating the Fifa Club World Cup. “It was a mistake,” he told the Swiss daily 24 heures last month. “FIFA should deal with national federations, not clubs.” Yet this ‘mistake’ is part of Blatter’s legacy, which his successor, Gianni Infantino, embraced without hesitation.
Already in 2016, nine months after his election, Infantino had proposed an expanded version to replace the old format, involving seven teams (the six continental champions plus a representative of the host country) every December since 2005. period of 10 days. “We need to make the Club World Cup more interesting for teams, but also for fans around the world,” he said. “That will attract more sponsors and television companies from all over the world.”
The icy reception his proposal received from UEFA, which threatened a walk-out, caused Infantino to revise his blueprint. A year later, he proposed that 24 teams would participate in the competition, which would replace the Confederations Cup from 2021. Then Covid struck, the plan was abandoned and a four-week, 32-team tournament will take place next year. from June 15 to July 13, “an unforgettable celebration of our game that will revolutionize club football,” in the words of Infantino.
But will it even happen? Seven months after the opening game in Miami, the sponsors and television companies that Infantino thought would be in line remain unconvinced. Only one commercial partner has been found, which can hardly be considered “new”: the Chinese electronics group Hisense, a sponsor of FIFA since the 2018 World Cup. Others are biding their time and won’t commit until they know which broadcasters will cover the event, and how; but those broadcasters have not committed either. FIFA aimed to make the revamped competition the second most lucrative event after the Men’s World Cup, with broadcast revenues of $4 billion. This would have made it the most expensive event in the sport’s history, with each match costing a potential global broadcaster $63.5 million.
It is believed that only one offer was made, by Apple TV, but for only a quarter of the hoped-for $4 billion. In September, it was reported that Infantino had called an emergency briefing with top executives of global broadcasters to break the impasse. When contacted by the Guardian, FIFA declined to comment on these figures, citing commercial and media rights confidentiality, but said there would be “more announcements in the coming weeks”. FIFA confirmed that the briefing had taken place, but said it was not in the nature of an “emergency” and was “a joint action towards the industry to present a new product, organized and delivered together with ECA.” [European Club Association]”.
FIFA tried to sprinkle extra stardust on its product by deciding that the host nation, the USA, would be represented by David Beckham and Lionel Messi’s Inter Miami, by virtue of winning the Supporters’ Shield, awarded to the MLS team is awarded with the best record at the end of the regular season. Inter Miami’s qualification for the Club World Cup, announced by Infantino, did not meet the criteria set by FIFA in previous editions of the tournament, when the host country’s representative would have been national champions – and Inter Miami, which played in the MLS Cup was turned off. first round of the play-offs, are out of the race for the title, which will be decided on December 7.
FIFA told the Guardian that it had “held discussions with MLS throughout 2024 to determine the possibilities of determining the berth of one host member association… The winner of the MLS Supporters’ Shield was an option that was proposed and discussed. Under FCWC rules, this is ultimately a FIFA decision.” It also said that “the vested interests of others are afraid [the Club World Cup’s] success means that they actively try to undermine it by falling back to the disappointing level of whether the winner of a national competition structure should rightly qualify or not.” MLS’s response was shorter. “FIFA managed the process and decided to award the hosting spot to Inter Miami. For further questions, please contact FIFA.”
Broadcasters and sponsors are not the only stakeholders who have shown a clear lack of enthusiasm. European players’ unions, backed by global organization Fifpro, filed a lawsuit against FIFA in June at the Brussels Commercial Court, “questioning the legality of FIFA’s decisions to unilaterally determine the international match calendar, and in particular the decision to create and plan the international competition calendar of the 2025 FIFA Club World Cup”.
There are more questions than answers everywhere. The uncertainty is so great that Real Madrid have not budgeted any revenue from the 2025 Club World Cup in their annual financial forecasts because “there [was] no precise information on the subject”. Their manager Carlo Ancelotti – later corrected by his club – went so far as to say that FIFA could ‘forget’ his team’s participation, that ‘like us, other clubs will reject the invitation’, and that it was not just about the money went. .
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During summer tournaments such as a European Championship or World Cup, top clubs are more or less equally affected. Not this time. Clubs such as Barcelona, Liverpool and Milan who have not qualified can offer their squads the usual four-week holiday before pre-season training. Real, Manchester City and Inter will be at a clear disadvantage at the start of the season. Furthermore, if they go deep into the league and release their players in July, they won’t be able to call on them for the cash-grab tours that double as pre-season preparation. Who would pay to organize a Real Madrid friendly that did not include Vinícius Júnior, Kylian Mbappé and Jude Bellingham?
Non-European clubs will also be affected. Those competing in the Argentine, Brazilian, Korean and Japanese leagues will have to drop out of domestic competitions while they are in full swing, as their seasons run from spring to autumn in the Northern Hemisphere.
The drawing will take place on December 5 in Miami. The “innovative” trophy, which has Infantino’s name engraved twice with a laser, was unveiled a few days ago. We are so far down the road that turning back is impossible. Yet the doubts surrounding the tournament are so great that directors of clubs that will participate are privately wondering whether the tournament will go ahead. After all, it’s happened before. Wasn’t the 2001 edition of the Club World Cup “postponed” following the collapse of FIFA’s then marketing partner ISL, which had “caused major difficulties in selling the 2001 edition to sponsors and broadcasters”?