As warned last December, the Spanish League filed a complaint against FIFA before the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), due to the conflict that arose when Gianni Infantino announced that he would modify the form of competition of the tournament that brings together the champions. of the different continents from 2025, since it would be reorganized with 32 teams, more matches and every four years, as if it were a World Cup for teams.
The arguments of the Spanish entity chaired by Javier Tebas to take this position were the following: “FIFA seems to forget and only think of a few without knowing the real effect on all the players in professional football. It only thinks of a small group of clubs and players, when in professional football there are many professional leagues, thousands of clubs and players who don’t play these international competitions”.
And he also warned: “These decisions taken unilaterally and without notice regarding the calendar with new international tournaments irreversibly damage the entire football ecosystem.”
It is not the first time that an organization denounces FIFA for problems in the calendar. It already happened in 2021, when Conmebol extended the national team stoppages to give priority to a third game in the concentrations, which affected First Division teams. Thebes tried to obtain a precautionary measure to avoid the situation, but the TAS denied it.
How the Club World Cup will be new
The FIFA president himself was in charge of presenting the new Club World Cup with 32 teams, which will take place from 2025.
Infantino pointed out on December 16 that to increase the chances of teams from the various confederations playing each other, FIFA will create friendly tournaments, called “FIFA World Series,” to be held in March in even-numbered years before the tournament. .
This new format would be similar to that of the World Cup, with eight groups of four teams. The idea of this tournament is to present a new club cup at the international level, instead of the traditional championship every year.
Of the last 15 editions of the Club World Cup, European teams have won it 14 times. The only champion that did not belong to the Old Continent was Corinthians from Brazil in 2012, who won the final against Chelsea.
Likewise, Infantino did not detail how many teams from each confederation will participate in the club tournament and only limited himself to mentioning that the 2025 edition will be held in Morocco.