Fifa's Club World Cup shambles: content first and to hell with the football

Telegraph

4 hours ago

The hotel receptionist in Atlanta was confused. 'So, if it is the World Cup, why are there so few people here?' she asked. It is the Club World Cup, she was told, not the World Cup. That is next year.
'Ah,' she responded. 'So, what is the Club World Cup?'
Good question. Given the capital of Georgia is the home of the MLS club Atlanta United, with its stunningly impressive 71,000-capacity stadium and styling itself as the 'epicentre of soccer' in the United States, it should be the one place where awareness of this tournament is not an issue.
But that bespoke stadium was less than a third full for Chelsea's first game and even the draw of Lionel Messi did not work, with his Inter Miami attracting a crowd of just 31,783 when they faced Porto there three days later. In fairness, Atlanta United's average gate is 44,000, but neither of the first two games came close to that either.
Sports bars are primarily showing ice hockey and baseball or, even, the Concacaf Gold Cup, in which Mauricio Pochettino's US side are playing, although there were many Flamengo fans in Philadelphia, Palmeiras ones in New York and the Boca Juniors supporters are also out in huge force in Miami, as witnessed by Friday night's raucous game against Bayern Munich.
It feels like South America has embraced the Club World Cup, which is no surprise given it is the middle of their season and it is far closer than Europe. They, at least, have the energy for it and are eager to prove a point.
Fifa is inevitably trumpeting ticket sales rather than whether the stadiums are filling out – they have been at 57 per cent capacity - without saying how many of those tickets are sold at vast discount. Even if they were hugely overpriced in the first place.
'63 Super Bowls in one month,' declared Fifa president Gianni Infantino, whose brainchild this 32-team, hugely bloated vanity project, sorry, tournament, was. But do we really need that and why compare football to American football? Incidentally, NFL players play only 17 games in a regular season. Manchester City's Josko Gvardiol has played 61. And counting.
But then bigger and bigger is Infantino's mantra even if large parts of stadiums have been taken off sale because of the lack of interest.
Nevertheless, it would be no surprise to see the next edition in four years' time enlarged to 48 – after all, the champions of England (Liverpool), Spain (Barcelona) and Italy (Napoli) are not here, and neither are other big clubs, including Manchester United and Arsenal. And Fifa will know they may have shifted more tickets. Never mind the quality, feel the width, as the old saying goes.
It is also already clear that only the US can probably ever cope with hosting it. How a Middle Eastern states such as Qatar or Saudi Arabia would love to but given it can be played only in the summer – surely even Fifa cannot shoehorn it in anywhere else in the calendar – it would be prohibitively hot. Although we still wait to hear how Saudi Arabia will manage the 2034 World Cup.
It is hot enough here. Dangerously hot. Four games have now been delayed because of thunderstorms – including Palmeiras against Al Ahly at the MetLife Stadium in New Jersey which I attended and which is not a suitable venue for fan or player. But it is where the semi-finals and final will be held and it will also host next year's World Cup final.
The second half of Benfica's 6-0 rout of Auckland City, who had already lost 10-0 to Bayern, kicked off two hours late in Orlando – where City face Juventus on Thursday in the 5pm swelter - and a heatwave is expected in the next few days across the US.
Temperatures are already in the mid-30Cs and the strain is telling on players who have gone through a tough European season and look exhausted. Neither does it help that the kick-offs for many games – 12pm/2pm (5pm/7pm in the UK) are recklessly illogical for player welfare.
At times, it feels like the country, and the competition, is too big. It looks like a competition that has been dreamt up by people who do not really have a sense for the sport.
Instead, we are looking at content. At a product. At an event where the football is almost secondary which given it is Fifa's baby – and Fifa is supposed to be the custodian of the game – is pretty damning.
In fact, there has been more talk of the prize money - £97 million for winning it – and the size of the Tiffany-made and Infantino-commissioned trophy than the actual football being played.
Even the televising of it through DAZN, in that remarkable $1billion deal for a tournament that looked like it would have to be given away for free at exactly the same time as the streamer and broadcaster received Saudi investment for the same amount, is designed for clips to be spread on social media.
Fifa and DAZN are funding an army of social influencers and YouTubers to big up the event, with the American IShowSpeed on the pitch during the first game – involving Messi's Inter Miami – for an embarrassing 'cross-bar challenge', while influencers such as the transfer journalist Fabrizio Romano are being paid to promote it in another move that blurs the lines.
Complaining sports reporters will always be awarded the world's smallest violins but it is important, for example, to state that Infantino has not done one single press conference or allowed himself to be accountable.
Fifa has dismissed the criticism as the usual negativity from European and, more specifically, British journalists and pointed out that South American, African and Asian media have been far more enthusiastic.
That enthusiasm has included one Moroccan journalist in Philadelphia continually shouting 'Phil, Phil, Phil' at Phil Foden as he spoke in a mixed zone and complaining about not being able to get a question in – only to then ask the Manchester City midfielder for a 'selfie'.
Press boxes have also featured 'journalists' wearing club shirts, while DAZN held a media conference in Miami to announce its coverage which was largely taken up by Pete Oliver, the chief executive of growth markets, asking questions to the other three employees on stage, including a YouTuber called OussiFooty. 'Fifa just invented it. I think it's amazing,' Christian Vieri, the former Italian striker turned DAZN pundit, said, although he appeared a little vague on who was playing and the format.
There have been innovations, such as players walking out individually, which do not feel right but cannot be just dismissed. There is nothing wrong with trying out new things even if there has been resistance from clubs to requests for managers to wear microphones and providing access to dressing rooms.
Porto allowed the cameras in for their first game, while City assistant coach Kolo Toure was interviewed during the 2-0 win over Wydad Casablanca. The ref cam has been used – not least to show why Rico Lewis was sent off in that match.
As ever, there is the concern over the politics. Bizarrely, the American national anthem has been played an hour before kick-off for every game, when the stadiums are still pretty empty, while one of the most unforgettable images has, unfortunately, been the Juventus players looking distinctly uncomfortable as they were forced to meet Donald Trump at the Oval Office, during which the US president launched into a tirade on Iran and transgender athletes, with Infantino looking on.
'They told us that we have to go and I had no choice but to go,' Timothy Weah, the forward and US international, said. 'It was a bit weird. When he started talking about the politics with Iran and everything, it's kind of like, 'I just want to play football, man'.' That does not always appear the priority in Fifa world.
And what of the football? Undoubtedly the best – by far – has been played by the South Americans and, in particular, the Brazilians. Flamengo were outstanding in taking apart Chelsea, just as Botafogo excelled in beating Paris St-Germain.
The European clubs have the superstars and the squads but they are not robots and Fifa might even suffer the deserved embarrassment of some big teams going home early.
Inevitably, there will be more jeopardy when the knockouts begin. But there have been too many mismatches in the group games and little excitement. And while Pep Guardiola was as diplomatic as possible in answering questions about Wydad's tactics in his pre-match press conference, he clearly knew very little about them.
And the fan experience? It is, frankly, a nightmare to get to some of the stadiums, especially those built for American football, such as the Hard Rock Stadium in Miami and the MetLife. Factor in two hours there and back for relatively short road trips – if a taxi can drop you anywhere close. Public transport? In many places, such as Miami, just forget it.
Fifa's dynamic pricing ticketing, sold through Ticketmaster, was designed to maximise revenue (ie, therefore, greed) and has again taken advantage of those fans, even if many have decided enough is enough. And although the US is a great country with some fabulous, exciting cities, it is not cheap and, presumably, prices will go only up further for next year's World Cup, capitalising on the fact that Americans are used to paying through the nose for sports events.
The sense before the tournament was that the main talking points would be empty stadiums, the Trump/Infantino bromance, politics and player fatigue and burnout. And that it would be something of a slow burn. Unfortunately, all of that has come to pass in what is – and what always felt like – a tournament too big and too far.