The expanded – and, FIFA hopes, much more successful – Club World Cup is set to kick off in June 2025, as a warm-up for the traditional men’s event a year later.
Sky Sports UK reports the 32-team tournament will take place between June 15 and July 13, 2025, finishing roughly four weeks before the new Premier League season begins.
The current event, a yearly tournament between the six continental confederation winners, gathers very little interest particularly in Europe – even though its teams have won the last 10 events.
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Since the turn of the century only three non-European teams – Brazil’s Corinthians (2000 and 2012), Sao Paulo (2005) and Internacional (2006) – have won the tournament, with the UEFA Champions League winner typically only needing to play two matches (the semi-final and final) which are frequently thrashing.
In an attempt to turn the Club World Cup into a cash-cow FIFA has expanded the event to 32 teams, with 12 slots for UEFA – its four Champions League winners over the 2020-24 period, plus the eight-best eligible teams in the four-year ranking – plus six for South America, four for North/Central America, Africa and Asia, one for Oceania and a team from the host nation.
This means Chelsea, Real Madrid and Manchester City, as the last three UEFA Champions League winners, have already qualified along with Brazil’s Palmeiras, Flamengo and Fuminense, Mexico’s Monterrey and Leon, the USA’s Seattle Sounders, Morocco’s Wydad Casablanca, Egypt’s Al Ahly, Japan’s Urawa Red Diamonds and Saudi Arabia’s Al-Hilal (featuring Neymar).
No Australian teams will appear after the A-League’s Melbourne City were knocked out in the group stage of this year’s AFC Champions League.
There are concerns over the timing and length of the event due to its proximity to the resumption of the European season.
“The global players’ union FIFPRO has told the governing body that players need a mandatory 28-day off-season break,” Sky UK reported.
“If that was adopted in 2025 it would pose challenges for the Premier League over what to do about teams reaching the Club World Cup final and potentially needing to start the new domestic season about 28 days later when pre-season training would usually be required.
“A further headache would be a team also required to play in the 2025 Community Shield which is played a week before the Premier League starts.
“And starting the season later than usual for all teams would be challenging for the Premier League because players need to be released by their clubs to national teams on 25 May 2026 ahead of the World Cup being staged in the U.S., Canada and Mexico.”
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The 2023 Club World Cup, the final seven-team event, is currently underway with Manchester City facing Urawa Red Diamonds, and Fluminese facing Al-Ahly, in the semi-finals early next week before the final on December 22.
Karim Benzama’s Al-Ittihad were knocked out by Al-Ahly in the previous stage.
