CLUB WORLD CUP
Morocco’s Wydad Casablanca, Ahly to represent Africa at expanded 32-team FIFA Club World Cup
The United States will host the Club World Cup in 2025, the first time the FIFA tournament will have 32 teams. Already assured of slots are two African clubs, Wydad Casablanca of Morocco and Ahly of Egypt.
They join Real Madrid, Manchester City and Chelsea who also already earned places as recent UEFA Champions
Other teams already qualified for the 2025 Club World Cup are: Palmeiras (Brazil), Flamengo (Brazil), Monterrey (Mexico), Leon (Mexico), Urawa Red Diamonds (Japan) and Al Hilal (Saudi Arabia)
League winners for the expanded tournament lineup that is set to test stadiums and operations one year before the 2026 World Cup.
The United States will host the men’s World Cup with Canada and Mexico, and FIFA could yet give some Club World Cup games to those countries.
The Club World Cup will take place in June-July 2025. The United States was chosen as host Friday during an online meeting of the FIFA Council.
FIFA praised “the United States’ position as a proven leader in staging global events and because it would allow FIFA to maximize synergies with the delivery” of the 2026 tournament.
The Seattle Sounders also are in the lineup for the Club World Cup as the 2022 champion of North American soccer region CONCACAF. The Americans should get another entry as the host nation.
Storied European teams have visited the United States for preseason friendly games for years but the expanded club tournament will give fans a rare chance to see 12 of them play competitive games.
FIFA said in March the basic qualification path for clubs was to win a continental championship in any of the four years from 2021 to 2024 in the five main confederations: Africa, Asia, Europe, North America and South America.
Europe with 12 teams and South America with six are the only continents with more than four entries. Extra places should be awarded according to team rankings by results a four-year span in continental competitions.
The current seven-team Club World Cup for continental champions played every season creates little broad appeal and FIFA has long wanted to stage a full-sized tournament every four years.
This expanded version in 2025 is a huge commercial opportunity for FIFA to try new broadcasting models and sign new sponsors, funding hundreds of millions of dollars in prize money for the clubs.
The influential European Club Association said in March it hoped for talks with FIFA on how to manage the commercial rights.
The format for a Club World Cup lasting about three weeks has yet to be decided. One option is guaranteeing the 32 teams at least three games each playing in eight groups of four. The eight group winners could then advance to the quarterfinals. That would create a tournament of 56 games if a third-place game was included.
The current annual Club World Cup format will continue with a final edition scheduled for December in Saudi Arabia.
Reviving the Club World Cup was a priority for FIFA president Gianni Infantino on being elected in 2016, but his first project plan was blocked. A Saudi-linked $25 billion deal with Japanese technology investor SoftBank provoked anger from European soccer officials who saw it as secretive and an overreach by FIFA.
FIFA got agreement in 2019 for a 24-team event to launch in June 2021 in China, but that was canceled because of the coronavirus pandemic before commercial details had been confirmed.
FIFA came back with a fresh Club World Cup plan after the Super League project led by an elite group of clubs quickly failed in April 2021 while causing intense turmoil for European soccer body UEFA.
CLUB WORLD CUP
Referees’ body cameras will provide fans with unprecedented views of on-field action, says FIFA
FIFA unveiled its team of 117 match officials, opens new tab on Monday for the inaugural Club World Cup and said referees would wear body cameras and enforce stricter goalkeeper time-wasting rules at the tournament to be staged across the United States.
The FIFA Referees Committee appointed the officials from 41 member associations – 35 referees, 58 assistant referees and 24 video match officials – for the June 14 to July 13 event.
Body cameras will provide fans with unprecedented views of on-field action, FIFA said, while goalkeepers who hold the ball beyond eight seconds will now see opponents awarded corner kicks rather than indirect free kicks.
“We think that it is a good chance to offer the viewers a new experience, in terms of images taken from a perspective, from an angle of vision, which was never offered before,” said Pierluigi Collina, chairman of the FIFA Referees Committee.
“It also has a purpose in terms of referee coaching because, of course, having the possibility to see what the referee sees is important in the debriefing.”
Collina highlighted the historic nature of the appointments for the expanded tournament featuring 32 teams from all six FIFA confederations and spanning 12 stadiums in 11 U.S. host cities.
“The selected referees are among those who have the privilege to be part of this for the first time, so I’m sure that all the match officials will be thrilled,” he said.
“We are coming from high-standard performances delivered during the last FIFA tournaments. So the bar is higher and when you set the bar higher it’s more difficult to keep the standard. But we are working very hard and ‘Team One’ will make a solid contribution to the success of this exciting competition.”
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The expanded Club World Cup holding in the US has brought another innovation to football.
Referees at the championship holding from June 14 to July 13 will be equipped with body cameras and will implement a new rule to combat goalkeeper time-wasting.
Game directors will wear “body cameras as part of an experimental phase, the tests having been approved by IFAB ,” the body that oversees the rules of the game, the International Football Federation explained in a statement.
“We believe this is a good opportunity to offer viewers a new experience, with images taken from a perspective that has never been offered before,” explained FIFA Referees Committee chairman Pierluigi Collina.
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The change in football rules that allows goalkeepers to be punished with corner kicks will be implemented at the Club World Cup holding in June in the US.
The revelation was made by FIFA Referees Committee chairman Pierluigi Collina after the announcement that referees will wear body cameras.
This initiative is “both innovative for broadcasters and for referee training,” added the Italian, “because it is important to be able to put yourself in the referee’s shoes during the debriefing, to evaluate how the referee made his decisions, his point of view, etc. “
The competition will implement the new rule approved by the International Football Association Board (IFAB) on March 1, aimed at reducing time wastage by goalkeepers.
“If they hold the ball for more than eight seconds, the referee will award a corner. Previously, an indirect free kick could be awarded after six seconds.
Seminars for referees have been held recently. The one for UEFA referees was held at FIFA headquarters from March 31 to April 4. Another seminar was held in Dubai for referees from the AFC (Asia), CAF (Africa), and OFC (Oceania) from February 2 to 4, and a third for referees from CONMEBOL (South America) and CONCACAF (Central America and the Caribbean) took place in Buenos Aires from February 24 to 28.
“We need to see the game and the goals, not the refereeing,” said refereeing director Massimo Busacca. “The referee is the protagonist who should not be noticed during the match. A good referee doesn’t need to be seen or known. But he must be prepared. “
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