FIFA Club World Cup, a competition created in 2000, returns next summer with a brand new format, one that has brough some controversy as it extends the football calendar for some teams until mid July 2025, leaving them just one month of rest and putting at risk the health of the players.
Between June 15 to July 13, 2025, 32 teams from all over the world will play in the United States for the chance of winning a trophy that, traditionally only featured seven teams, the respective winners of AFC (Asia), CAF (Africa), CONCACAF (North America) CONMEBOL (Latin America), OFC (Oceania) and UEFA (Europe) cups, plus a second club from the host country, with UEFA and CONMEBOL teams jumping straight to semi-finals.
So, instead of being a yearly short format tournament that didn't bring in much interest, FIFA Club World Cup will be a competition held every four years, similar in style to FIFA World Cup, with clubs qualifying by winning the previous continental cups (like Champions League or Libertadores) as well as their ranking on their respective continental confederations.
In practice, it will resemble the FIFA World Cup, with a round-robin, quarterfinals, semi-finals and a grand final, during the same dates in the middle of the summer we are used to see the nations fight for the most prestigious football cup in the world. Although it remains to be seen if this new trophy will gather much interest...
UEFA teams qualified for FIFA Club World Cup 2025
Chelsea (ENG) - 2020/21 UEFA Champions League
Real Madrid (ESP) - 2021/22 and 2023/24 UEFA Champions League
Manchester City (ENG) - 2022/23 UEFA Champions League
Bayern Munich (GER) - UEFA ranking pathway
Paris Saint-Germain (FRA) - UEFA ranking pathway
Inter Milan (ITA) - UEFA ranking pathway
Porto (POR) - UEFA ranking pathway
Benfica (POR) - UEFA ranking pathway
Borussia Dortmund (GER) - UEFA ranking pathway
Juventus (ITA) - UEFA ranking pathway
Atletico Madrid (ESP) - UEFA ranking pathway
FC Salzburg (AUT) - UEFA ranking pathway
These are the 12 European teams that will take part in the first FIFA Club World Cup in the new format. Despite changing radically the format and even designing a new trophy, it will continue the track records of the previous yearly editions. Manchester City is the current title holder and Real Madrid the one with more wins, five.
This afternoon, Thursday December 5, the eight groups for the group stage will be announced live at 19:00 CET. Yesterday, FIFA announced a record breaking sum to give DAZN worldwide rights for the competition...
FIFA Club World Cup and FIFA Intercontinental Cup are not the same thing
And let's not forget that FIFA also holds the Intercontinental Cup, which is something completely different, and more akin to what FIFA Club World Cup used to be - and, for some years, they were technically the same thing.
The Intercontinental Cup will be held annually pitting the winners of the six FIFA confederations of the previous year, although the European winner will jump straight to the final. This year's final and semi-final, its first edition, takes place this month, with Real Madrid playing against either Botafugo, Pachuca or Al Ahly on December 18.