They used arguably the fairest criteria. No complaints from me whatsoever. It also looks like clubs will be taking it serious, seeing as Madrid paid Liverpool to let Trent play, and Al-Hilal are going big for Bruno. Hopefully it will be very competitive. I feel it is a competition that should have been introduced a long time ago.
FIFA Club World Cup, Tonight: Bayern vs. Boca; LAFC 0-1 ES Tunis (Benfica 6-0 Auckland; Flamengo 3-1 Chelsea)
- Thread starter Pintu
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Nik (@Rood), Jamie (@Vault Dweller) and Ed (@That'sHernandez) give their end of season awards out! They celebrate the best players, goals and moments of the season (there were some, honestly) and also give out awards for the worst and most disappointing players/moments of the season.
They then discuss all the latest transfer rumours and get into the potential ins and outs this summer at Old Trafford.
The fact that it's free to watch helps neutral fans take an interest. You don't need to find a dodgy stream to watch a friendly or sub to a clubs website.
I want to see African and South American clubs play proper competitive football against European clubs.
It's absolutely hilarious that after no TV channel wanting to acquire the rights (which should say something about the level of enthusiasm there is, considering they'd have gone for it if they felt it could be used to reel in advertisers and so on), they were finally sold for a ridiculous amount in the most obvious case of conflict of interest/bribery there is. It's a perfect encapsulation of what FIFA is.
But to your point, yes it will surely help with the viewing figures (which will likely be inflated anyway).
You misspelled "money".So Real Madrid won the Intercontinental Cup in December and are the current World Club Champions. But the team who wins this in July will then be the new World Club Champions. And then the team that wins the 2025 FIFA Intercontinental Cup are declared World Club Champions.
So all this nonsense every 4 years just for a team to be ''World Club Champions'' for 6 months.
What a farce.
People don't like it because it's just more greedy fixture bloat. It's also a competition with no real history that's 5th tier, winning the community shield is about as important. They keep on adding more and more games in and most of them are very poor quality or outright pointless. They've changed the CL rules for next season to try and make the 150 game group phase at least count more for something. People in charge can see the problem... TV rights already started to collapse in some countries like France...
Having a hundreds of poor quality games could be counter productive ultimately. Have to see who is prepared to pay to watch and how much in the next few years and decades as the dinosaur pay TV models finally head for extinction.
Having a hundreds of poor quality games could be counter productive ultimately. Have to see who is prepared to pay to watch and how much in the next few years and decades as the dinosaur pay TV models finally head for extinction.
Indeed.
Unless we win the UCL in the next 3 years it will surely be Arsenal and Liverpool from the ranking or another English side managing to win it and blocking a higher ranked team. (Villa are currently ahead but they won’t get points next season)
1 season out makes big difference.
Where’s the vomit emoji when you need it?
It looks so shit anyway. If I was buying a jersey from the club that won it I'd say no thank you for the pleasure of adding it for ten quid.
I don't really understand why people don't want to watch more football, I think this is a good concept and really hope it kicks on. I'd hope that if we had managed to get into this it would replace the preseason tour where we just play pointless games, at least here, there is something, potentially, more prestigious to compete for.
I really hope we improve enough for a place over the next 4 years.
I really hope we improve enough for a place over the next 4 years.
I don’t see anything prestigious at all, just a tacky, money grabbing FIFA plastic tournament, because they’re worried about UEFAs success.
I didn’t want to play in the World Club Championship when we were forced to
The European Cup wasn't treated the same at one point. Why not want to compete against the best clubs from every continent, and it being only once every 4 years, I cant see an issue. Of course FIFA want a cash grab, we've just been to Asia for a deadwood cash grab, then off to America for the same. Surely this is a much better option, especially with the other big European teams seemingly taking it seriously.
I really like the idea of this tournament and absolutly think it should be a big deal.
The problem is that there are so many unecessary football clogging the calendar. If we could remove the unecessary filler games I think there would be alot more excitement for this.
The problem is that there are so many unecessary football clogging the calendar. If we could remove the unecessary filler games I think there would be alot more excitement for this.
FIFA as if they don't have enough money already. Look on enviously at UEFAs golden goose I.e. CL. So decide to launch their own version. No broadcaster wants to pay for it so it goes free to air. No teams wanted to play in it, until FIFA up'd the prize money massively.
It's not even a yearly tournament.
Wish I was a uber wealthy FIFA executive, I could come up with this rubbish on my lunch break.
It's not even a yearly tournament.
Wish I was a uber wealthy FIFA executive, I could come up with this rubbish on my lunch break.
Just read they’ve had to slash ticket prices as thousands of tickets still unsold.
It is strange there is no talk from Rodri about going on strike cos of too many games now, I thought he said players were close to striking and should only play 40-50 games a season.
I really don't get the "too many games" a season. Use bigger squads and rotate players more. Sure, the argument that it will only make the gap between between the clubs is valid, but at the same time, the biggest teams then needs to play more games, which will force them to use more players which in turn will make the smaller team have a bigger chance in their own league.
So, for me, this kind of tournaments will be fun and will be a nice addition in sleepy June. And as pointed out, it's just every fourth year. It's this or boring jippo games.
I would have loved United taking part this summer...
So, for me, this kind of tournaments will be fun and will be a nice addition in sleepy June. And as pointed out, it's just every fourth year. It's this or boring jippo games.
I would have loved United taking part this summer...
I wont watch any. Because we’re not in it.
Agree. The players’ union need to complain about the amount of games they’re playing. Also heard they slashed tickets prices for the opening game. Hopefully this doesn’t work out.
More games definitely doesn't equal more quality football. Look at NFL, worlds most profitable sport. Each team plays max of 18 games a season.
Football should have a cap on max number of games a player can play domestically and internationally. However I don't think it would ever come to fruition.
So effectively this is a lot of clubs preseason then? Like City will go from this and go straight into a summer off and then start the season right?
Crazy how fatigued these players will be.
Advantage to the clubs who aren’t in this.
Crazy how fatigued these players will be.
Advantage to the clubs who aren’t in this.
Especially as next season goes into a expanded world cup. If we could start the season well and maintain it, especially with no European football. In theory our players should be pretty fit and not fatigued. So we should take advantage.
But this is Utd a decade after fergie, so we probably won't...
They've been running dynamic pricing on it the whole time apparently.
Still, who really wants to watch Ulsan HD v Mamelodi Sundowns or Wyad AC v Al Ain unless you're a fan of them already? Not really the sorts of teams that would draw interest from neutrals or the curious. Chances are a lot of people will never have heard of them, especially in USA where football is still an emerging sport.
Luckily some of the matches are in smaller stadiums that hold around 20k so it might not look too bad.
It would've been better if the tournament started late June right? Give the players 4 weeks rest after a long season.
Tournament would end late July, have 2 weeks off, than the start of the new PL season.
Players would be fitter and sharper for the upcoming season.
Tournament would end late July, have 2 weeks off, than the start of the new PL season.
Players would be fitter and sharper for the upcoming season.
Thats fine for countries that are in Europe and their seasons end in May. Trouble is with respect to a world club cup thats not when seasons in other parts of the world end.
It is simply the same slot as a WC or EC. Mid-June to mid-July.
The owners of one of teams competing in the tournament are now an official partner with the tournament organisers. Very normal situation.
Qatar Airways has sponsorship deals with Uefa and both teams in the last UCL final (main sponsor for PSG, and secondary sponsor for Inter -training kit or something like that-)
PIF could potentially have many more teams in the next CWC. (Al-Ahli already qualified, 3 other clubs in KSA can still make it + Newcastle)
There are absolutely too many games but feck it, I'll still be watching.
I like the platform it gives to non European teams that I personally never watch for a start, even though I'm really not sure how they're going to measure up against the European sides. It will help it feel a bit less like a poor mans Champions League if a couple do well though.
I like the platform it gives to non European teams that I personally never watch for a start, even though I'm really not sure how they're going to measure up against the European sides. It will help it feel a bit less like a poor mans Champions League if a couple do well though.
FIFA is such a lovely organisation.
Might as well just start having the All-Star games as Todd Boehly proposed, with an All-Star team made up of northern clubs playing against the southern All-Stars.
You'd have to limit it to 2 players from an individual club otherwise it's all Madrid, Barcelona and PSG players.
Maybe we should group the All Star teams by nation?
We should group them alphabetically.
The early 00s Rs would've been hard to beat
I'm sure people would attend the matches, it gives people who have a hard time getting tickets to watch teams a chance to watch some of the best players in the premier league.
Although, that is nothing like the club world cup, the most successful teams from every continent in a 4 year period in a tournament against each other is a pretty exciting prospect.
What do you dislike about this competition that you like about the Champions League, Europa League, Conference League, FA cup, league cup etc?