October 10 – FIFA president Gianni Infantino wants Europe’s clubs us to keep an “open mind”, suggesting that the World Cup could be moved from its traditional summer slot to March or October – so football can “be better for everyone”.
The issue here is that football will not be better for everyone and in fact will be significantly worse for 95%+ of Europe’s clubs and all of its leagues. It won’t be good for its leading players either who are already struggling with increased workload. A total of 608 of the 831 players at the 2022 World Cup play for European clubs.
With Infantino’s increased competition sizes, and his move into the club game with the expanded 32-team Club World Cup (which he now wants to increase to 48 teams and hold every two years), the bulk of Europe’s professional players who are not competing in these competitions also face potentially disastrous consequences. Fracturing the infrastructure of the European game will inevitably threaten their jobs as clubs and leagues battle to retain sponsors and schedules in the face of an aggressive FIFA who want to hoover up everyone’s financial lunch.
Infantino claims that they are calendar is impossible but essentially his message to Europe and its clubs on the sidelines of the European Football Club meeting in Rome is to expect more disruption to your calendars more often.
“In December you cannot play in one part of the world and in July you cannot play in another,” he said. “We have to have an open mind.”
Earlier in the EFC’s plenary session his message to the clubs was: “Everywhere in the world there is football. Everywhere in the world they look at European football clubs. You are an example for the entire world. We stick together, we work together, we are united. We will develop [football] here in Europe — coming from Rome to the entire world.”
FIFA’s concept of unity, an open mind and transparent debate is different to others, especially Europe’s stakeholders where FIFA has refused to engage or invite either players’ union FIFPRO or the European Leagues Association to the discussion table – though one suspects there is very little discussion in any case.
The 2034 World Cup will be played in Saudi Arabia which almost guarantees that it will be moved to a winter slot. The full Club World Cup is next scheduled for 2029 and Spain, Portugal and Morocco are favourites to host. If the schedule becomes bi-annual, Qatar are most people’s front runners for 2031 which will again necessitate a move from summer.
Last summer, the United States hosted an expanded 32-team Club World Cup during a heatwave that saw temperatures in New York reach 39°C. Players complained, protests piled in from player unions, managers and clubs but the tournament went full-steam ahead with Infantino later calling it “a huge success from every possible angle.”
“Every possible angle,” of course, except the human one.
Infantino points to the Uefa Champions League’s growth from €40 million in its early years to a robust and growing €4 billion today as a model. He dreams of the Club World Cup generating €200 billion over the next three decades.
While the next three World Cups in North America, then in the Morocco-Portugal-Spain-South America, and finally back to the Middle East in Saudi Arabia promise record profits, the cost will be borne by the players, whose seasons never end, and the fans, priced out of the spectacle they built.
The wages of those players are paid by the clubs, not FIFA, and the money from the World Cup goes to FIFA with only a disproportionately small amount going to clubs. In essence, the clubs are funding FIFA’s World Cup finance fest, something Infantino refuses to acknowledge as he chases more and more money with very little thought for the top players without whom the World Cup would be a nonsense.
Unlike FIFA’s Congress where national federations generally sleepwalk their way through Infantino and FIFA’s agenda as they count the promises of money made for the next year, the club’s are different beasts with leaders who are not so complaint or easily bullied.
However, Infantino knows that in their leader, PSG’s Qatari chairman Nasser Al-Khelaifi, he has someone who, as their bromance grows without boundaries, will likely do what it takes to deliver the clubs to accept his calendar requirements. Other stakeholders be damned.
Contact the writer of this story at moc.l1760084452labto1760084452ofdlr1760084452owedi1760084452sni@r1760084452etsbe1760084452w.kci1760084452n1760084452. Additional reporting by moc.l1760084452labto1760084452ofdlr1760084452owedi1760084452sni@n1760084452osloh1760084452cin.l1760084452uap1760084452
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