'Influential friends' could rescue Man City and Chelsea as £69m off-pitch deal agreed - Kieran Maguire
Today at 02:07 PM
Man City and Chelsea will both take part in the expanded Club World Cup next summer, but FIFA have encountered a number of financial and commercial issues that are hanging over the tournament.
City are the reigning Club World Cup champions having beaten Fluminense 4-0 in the 2023 final, which was the last under the current format.
From 2025, the event will be held every four years rather than on annual basis and will feature a whopping 32 teams as oppose to the current system, which is one team from each confederation.
FIFA hope that the tournament can massively expand their revenues, in turn providing major prize money incentives for the likes of Man City and Chelsea.
Initially, FIFA had privately promised elite Club World Cup clubs up to £84m, which prompted Arsenal, Liverpool, Man United and Tottenham to back the tournament in the hopes of qualifying in future years.
But the amount on offer has seemingly dwindled due to FIFA’s struggles to find a media partner and big-paying sponsors, leaving Chelsea and Man City in limbo.
FIFA still hazy on Club World Cup finances as Man City and Chelsea await answers
FIFA released their rulebook for the Club World Cup this week, but details in the ‘financial provisions’ section were very thin on the ground.
‘The financial provisions regarding the distributable prize money to the participating clubs as well as solidarity payments to non-participating clubs shall be communicated by a tournament circular letter to participating clubs,’ was the only detail in the 62-page document.
“They don’t want to give anything concrete because it would back them into a corner,” Liverpool University football finance lecturer and industry insider Kieran Maguire told TBR Football.
“This is being sold as a profitable competition that will allow FIFA to make more generous distributions to its member associations.
“If it looks like a loss leader, if I am Vanuatu or the Cook Islands, I’d say this looks a bit daft because we’re ending up with less money rather than more.
FIFA to step in with sponsors?
As well as the absence of a TV deal which FIFA initially hoped would fetch £4bn, world football’s governing body have only confirmed one official sponsor, Hisense, seven months out from the start date.
This week, Sport Business reported that AB InBev are set to become the second partner to sign up in a deal worth £69m in total.
With the partnerships slowly starting to trickle in, FIFA could at least outline the mechanism by which prize money will be distributed, if not the amounts that will be handed out.
“FIFA doesn’t want to explicitly highlight the high risk that is associated with this competition,” said Maguire
“At the same time, there is still plenty of time to find new sponsors. I am very much in the watch-this-space position.
“Gianni Infantino has lots of influential friends and he might be able to turn that to the advantage of someone coming to the rescue at the last minute.”
The impact of Donald Trump’s re-election on the Club World Cup
With the tournament set to be hosted in the United States, will the geopolitical situation follow Donald Trump’s re-election as president have any bearing on FIFA’s ability to attract blue-chip sponsors.
Not according to Maguire.
“The global brands will do what’s best in their own self interest,” he said.
“That has been accelerated by the US election result, which has benefited corporates because of its corporate focus.
“There is so much focus on the 2026 World Cup that trying to get publicity and interest in terms of the Club World Cup is going to be difficult.
“It won’t be a priority for Donald Trump. He is a golf man rather than a football man.”
