Gianni Infantino didn’t hold back; instead, he took the bold step of announcing live to a packed stadium—and in front of TV cameras—that as the president of FIFA, he decides who plays in his tournaments.
This happened just last Sunday evening in Florida. Infantino declared to an astonished audience that Inter Miami would be part of the upcoming 32-team FIFA Club World Cup next summer. Meanwhile, cameras caught Inter’s captain Lionel Messi chuckling with his teammates, perhaps as surprised as the audience by Infantino’s boldness.
The expanded Club World Cup is Infantino’s big move to capture a slice of the lucrative club football broadcasting market, but it hasn’t been a smooth ride. Many domestic leagues are now pursuing legal action, players and their unions are worried about an overloaded calendar, clubs are uncertain about their earnings from the event, and broadcasters have yet to sign on publicly. If Saudi Arabia has agreed to finance the tournament, they’re keeping quiet about it.
Making matters more complicated, FIFA’s awkward qualification process and inconsistent performances mean that several high-profile European teams—including Manchester United, Liverpool, Arsenal, and Barcelona—won’t be participating. Even Cristiano Ronaldo’s Al-Nassr missed out on qualifying.
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In his bid to draw broadcaster interest, Infantino turned to one guaranteed crowd-pleaser: Messi. Perhaps the soccer icon hadn’t realized as he sat beside Infantino with the Major League Soccer (MLS) Supporters’ Shield that his summer was about to get booked. Infantino announced that the tournament, set to take place in the United States from June 15 to July 13, would kick off at Miami’s Hard Rock Stadium, where Messi would presumably take the field.
None of this had been settled when FIFA initially announced the qualification criteria. After the news broke, MLS clubs privately expressed their disappointment. Their understanding was that the Club World Cup spot would go to the winner of the MLS Cup after the playoff tournament wraps up on December 7. Unlike most leagues, which crown the regular season winners as champions, U.S. sports culture emphasizes playoffs, and MLS follows suit. For MLS, the champion isn’t decided until the MLS Cup final. The league assured its teams that FIFA had made this decision independently, while FIFA claims it consulted with MLS.
Infantino is clearly under pressure. Known for avoiding independent media and communicating mainly through polished Instagram content, he needed Messi in the Club World Cup to boost its appeal. Allowing Inter Miami to stumble in the playoffs was simply too risky.
Everything went according to plan
Before Sunday’s surprise announcement, four teams from the Concacaf region (North and Central America) had already qualified: the Seattle Sounders and three Mexican clubs. It would have been a nightmare scenario for FIFA if an underdog team like Columbus Crew or FC Cincinnati had bested Messi, Luis Suarez, and company in the MLS Cup. Broadcasters are interested in stars, and that’s what Infantino delivered.
FIFA denied that Infantino’s announcement was a spontaneous decision, claiming that the choice to send the MLS regular season winners as the host nation’s representatives had been made in advance, though they didn’t elaborate on how that conclusion was reached. Infantino’s approach increasingly feels like a real-world version of the star-studded atmosphere in the EA Sports video game that once bore FIFA’s name. With the fierce competition for broadcasting rights intensifying, it seems anything goes.
The 2021 Super League fiasco set the stage for invitation-only tournaments, and now the FIFA president feels empowered to set new qualification rules just eight months before the competition kicks off. Unfortunately, this hasn’t done much for the tournament’s credibility, which many view as already low. Ironically, FIFA initially argued that the Club World Cup would be an upgrade over pre-season friendlies and their ceremonial trophies.
FIFA-s long term vision
Infantino’s long-term vision is to chip away at the dominance of the UEFA Champions League and the English Premier League in the broadcasting market. He’s pushing for all domestic leagues, including the Premier League, to reduce to 18 teams. The aim is to free up more matchdays for FIFA events on the crowded calendar. Yet, for all his ambition, he still has to finance the Club World Cup’s first edition.
Saudi Arabia seems like the most likely financial partner, particularly if they secure the 2034 World Cup hosting rights at the FIFA Congress on December 11. In return, they’ll probably lend their support to Infantino’s ambitions. But once Saudi Arabia has its 2034 hosting bid locked in, Infantino’s leverage might diminish.
Chaotic with the contract rules
So far, Infantino’s other ambitious proposals haven’t panned out. His attempt to hold a biennial World Cup didn’t fly, and his 2018 proposal to expand the 2022 World Cup to 48 teams, potentially with Saudi Arabia as a co-host, was also rejected. This revamped Club World Cup is his latest strategy to generate more revenue for FIFA.
To make it happen, FIFA has had to tweak player contract rules, allowing players who become free agents on June 30 to compete in the knockout rounds. This has disrupted competing clubs’ summer schedules and pre-season plans. And then there’s the ongoing legal battle with European Leagues and the international players’ union, FIFPRO. It’s been chaotic, to say the least.
It doesn’t exactly paint the picture of a FIFA president fully in control. Nonetheless, FIFA will likely find the funds for this tournament that no one, except perhaps FIFA itself, seemed to want. Someone will probably step up to buy the broadcasting rights, but how much they’ll be worth is anyone’s guess. In the meantime, Infantino appears to be revising the qualification criteria on the fly. Just this week, in Addis Ababa, he was once again touting the Club World Cup as a positive step for football to anyone who would listen.
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