FIFA’s flawed Club World Cup: A glorified post-season club friendly, a progeny of greed, not a tournament where quality is priority
FIFA has long marketed the Club World Cup as the pinnacle of international club football. A stage where champions from every continent come together, it’s pitched as football’s answer to the World Cup, but for clubs. Yet in reality, the competition has often felt more like a glorified exhibition match rather than a meaningful tournament.
Now, with plans to expand the event into a 32-team format in 2025, critics argue the FIFA Club World Cup flaws are not just evident—they’re multiplying.
Quality Takes a Backseat to Quantity
The original idea behind the Club World Cup was commendable: crown a true global club champion. However, the execution has consistently underwhelmed. The format has historically favored European and South American teams, with clubs from Asia, Africa, and North America rarely making it past the early stages.
The expanded format doesn’t fix this imbalance—it deepens it. Instead of ensuring more competitive parity, it adds more matches, more travel, and more strain on an already congested football calendar. The increase in teams dilutes the quality of the tournament. In effect, it’s quantity over quality, spectacle over sport.
Post-Season Burnout
Another major flaw is the tournament’s timing. Scheduled at the end of the club season, players are already dealing with fatigue after a grueling domestic and continental calendar. For many, especially those playing in multiple competitions, this becomes an unwanted extension of their season.
What’s meant to be a moment of celebration and rest becomes yet another demanding commitment. Coaches worry about injuries. Players crave rest. Fans are divided between curiosity and indifference.
This issue isn’t new—it’s simply worsened by the new format. The summer of 2025 will see elite players juggling national team duties and the Club World Cup within weeks. In a sport already saturated with fixtures, where does player welfare truly fit into FIFA’s grand vision?
Money Talks—Louder Than Football
Let’s be honest: the Club World Cup’s expanded version is not a product of sporting ambition, but commercial ambition. FIFA sees a global marketplace: new regions, new broadcasters, new sponsors. With billions of dollars at stake, the tournament has transformed into a financial engine rather than a footballing milestone.
The core FIFA Club World Cup flaws revolve around this reality—football’s governing body is prioritizing profit over purpose. Just as with the controversial World Cup expansions, the Club World Cup is being engineered more as a marketing platform than a competitive sporting event.
Ticket sales, broadcast rights, merchandise—these are the tournament’s real trophies.
The European Bias
Europe’s dominance in the tournament is well documented. UEFA clubs have won the title every year since 2013. Even when faced with logistical challenges or squad limitations, European clubs have had little trouble dispatching opponents from other continents.
The problem isn’t just disparity in squad depth—it’s systemic. Clubs from outside Europe often face longer travel, less recovery time, and minimal media coverage. The structure does little to level the playing field.
The expanded format won’t fix this. If anything, it gives even more slots to European powerhouses, further skewing the competition. What was meant to be a stage for global champions becomes another showcase for the same elite clubs we already see every week in the UEFA Champions League.
A Tournament Without Identity
What does the Club World Cup stand for?
It’s not a historical competition like the UEFA Champions League or Copa Libertadores. It lacks the romanticism of domestic league titles or the passion of intercontinental rivalries. Even die-hard fans struggle to get excited about a tournament that often feels manufactured and out of sync with the rhythm of the footballing year.
Without a clear identity, the tournament flounders in purpose. Is it a global celebration of champions? A cash cow? A legacy project for FIFA? Until that question is answered, the Club World Cup will continue to struggle for legitimacy.
Final Whistle: Time to Rethink Priorities
There’s no denying that club football deserves a global platform. In theory, a Club World Cup could be one of the sport’s most exciting spectacles. But FIFA’s current approach doesn’t honor that potential.
Expanding the tournament without addressing its core problems—timing, fairness, quality, player welfare—only amplifies the issues. Instead of elevating club football, FIFA risks turning the event into a bloated, meaningless spectacle.
Football is at a crossroads. The sport needs innovation—but not at the cost of integrity. The world doesn’t need another superfluous tournament. It needs governing bodies that listen, evolve responsibly, and put the game—not just the revenue—first.
