The new version of the Club World Cup held in the United States is about to start, and the gathering of stars has indeed aroused people’s curiosity to a certain extent, but are the participating teams in the new version of the Club World Cup really, as Infantino said, the 32 strongest teams in the world? GOAL author Mark Doyle talks about this topic.
In April this year, FIFA President Infantino said at the Rose Bowl Stadium in Pasadena that the new version of the Club World Cup held in 2025 is a truly world-class club event.
In his opinion, the new version of the Club World Cup held in Miami this weekend will bring together 32 teams from 20 countries on six continents, “their players come from 86 countries.” At the same time, he also emphasized that the new Club World Cup will determine the title of the best team in the world for “for the first time in history”.
However, is this really the case? Does the new version of the Club World Cup really bring together the strongest teams in the world today?
Qualification
How can you participate in the new version of the Club World Cup? It is indeed quite complicated to figure out this matter. Football may be a global sport, but financial imbalance in recent years has led to Europe becoming increasingly the center of world football. In view of this, FIFA is ensuring that football federations of all continents have sufficient teams to participate, and also ensuring that the world’s most well-known teams and players can participate in this event.
From the basic perspective, FIFA has issued invitations to all teams that have won the InterContinental Club League from 2021 to 2024, and they have also issued additional places related to team performance based on the strength of each football league. This means that there will eventually be one representative from Oceania, four representatives from Asia, four representatives from Central and North America and the Caribbean, four representatives from Africa, six representatives from South America, and 12 representatives from Europe.
However, in the process of distributing the competition qualification, there are always some strange factors involved, and there are some obvious omissions.
Multiple 2025 Intercontinental Club Championships Absent
Although teams that won the Intercontinental Club Championship within four years can participate in this Club World Cup, for some teams, their current performance is really a world of difference from four years ago. For example, Monterrey, who has not won any championship since winning the Golden Cup in 2021, has not even won the quarterfinals of this year’s Mexican playoffs.
Vidad’s situation is similar. Although they won the 2022 African Champions League title, they are not even eligible to compete in this year’s event.
This means that this year’s Club World Cup does not have the participation of 2025 Asian champions, African champions and Central North American and Caribbean champions, which obviously poses doubts on Infantino’s declaration that “the 32 strongest teams in the world gather in the United States.”
The most obvious absentee
Even in Europe, which has 12 seats, there are obvious absentees. UEFA did not give away its 12 best teams. Of course, due to the UEFA Champions League rankings, the 24/25 Champions League champion Paris Saint-Germain and runner-up Inter Milan all have the opportunity to compete in the new version of the Club World Cup.
However, the league champions in Italy, Portugal, Spain and England all missed the gathering in the United States—their absence was undoubtedly particularly eye-catching.
Liverpool is absent? Salzburg? !
Liverpool’s situation is also quite interesting. The British giants, who won the Premier League championship in the 24/25 season, ranked eighth when UEFA was assigned to participate in the Club World Cup (now their ranking in UEFA has been improved to fourth place, second only to Real Madrid, Manchester City and Bayern). However, since UEFA stipulates that each national football association can only send two participating teams at most (except if more than two teams of the same football association win the top intercontinental tournament championship), Liverpool unfortunately misses.
In contrast, Chelsea won the title of Champions League champion in the 20/21 seasonQualification – although they have not participated in the Champions League for two consecutive seasons, and only Reese James is still in the team in the championship lineup that year.
Not only Liverpool, Barcelona and Naples were also blocked from the goal of this year’s new version of the Club World Cup, while Salzburg, which is not even the dominant in the Austrian League, was successfully shortlisted – this team ranked only 44th in UEFA’s latest ranking, far from the title of “Top 12 European Team”.
The result of this is a funny thing.
Messi factor
At the same time, FIFA must choose a team to represent the host. At first, people thought that this qualification would give the MLS finals championship in the 2024 season – this choice at least meets the selection criteria of other participating teams. However, the organizing committee did not do so, but instead handed this qualification to Miami International. Of course, Miami International is also the MLS regular season champion.
For this reason, many people think that the new version of the Club World Cup is to ensure that global idol Messi can participate in the event. Since then, Infantino also said that he believes that before the Club World Cup starts, there will definitely be a participating team that will sign Ronaldo.
Infantino believes that Miami International is the “necessary team to participate” and says they have proved that they are “the best team on the field.” However, Los Angeles Galaxy won the finals on December 7 last year, which is another powerful counterattack to the argument that the Club World Cup teams are the best teams.
FIFA is finding a balance
Getting a perfect balance between quality of the competition and equal participation is almost an impossible task for FIFA. They must find a way to meet all the needs of global representation and global appeal. Therefore, people can also understand itWhat Infantino has been doing his best to stimulate people’s interest in the Club World Cup.
The “mini transfer window” this summer will definitely help, as many well-known players, such as Arnold and Reindez, are now ready to make their debut for their new club in the United States.
Of course, we should also admit that given the diversity of participating teams, the Club World Cup in the United States this summer will be a more interesting attempt, by nature. At least, it can arouse the curiosity of more ordinary fans, for example, they must now know that the best teams in Europe may not always win the Champions League.
However, when Infantino said that this Club World Cup had already brought together the 32 strongest teams in the world, this statement would not make the Club World Cup more attractive. Especially the absence of Liverpool, which owns Salah, and Barcelona, which owns Yamal, make this sentence even more “unconfident”.
(Armour)
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