April 15 – Concacaf president Victor Montagliani has added his voice to the growing concern over the proposal to expand the World Cup to 64 teams, saying growing the number of teams “would not be the right move”.
At the FIFA Council in March, Uruguayan football boss Ignacio Alonso suggested expansion of the 2030 World Cup.FIFA subsequently said it would analyse the proposal.
Since then Conmebol president Alejandro Dominguez has been banging the drum for expansion to 64 teams. FIFA president Gianni Infantino has been publicly quiet on the proposal, though insiders say that he is in favour and that the idea was originally his. Conmebol have frequently been his route to market for changes he wants – the most spectacular of these most recently having been the proposal for a biennial World Cup schedule.
With Montagliani adding his voice to the growing anti-64-team World Cup lobby, he joins fellow FIFA vice presidents Sheikh Salman bin Ibrahim Al Khalifa (AFC president), and UEFA president Aleksander Čeferin. After Infantino, they are the next three most powerful political figures in the world governing body.
“At Concacaf, we’ve shown that we are open to change by supporting the Women’s World Cup expansion and the continuous evolution of our Confederation’s men’s and women’s national team and club events,” Montagliani told ESPN.
“I don’t believe expanding the men’s World Cup to 64 teams is the right move for the tournament itself and the broader football ecosystem, from national teams to club competitions, leagues, and players.”
Yesterday Salman warned against expansion to 64-teams and the ‘chaos’ is could lead to, telling Agence France Press: “Personally, I don’t agree.”
As far as he is concerned the 2030 edition will be played with 48 teams, saying that the “the matter is settled”.
“If the issue remains open to change, then the door will not only be open to expanding the tournament to 64 teams, but someone might come along and demand raising the number to 132 teams,” said Salman. “Where would we end up then? It would become chaos.”
His comments echoed those of Čeferin, made after UEFA’s Congress earlier this month, saying that this is “a bad idea”.
“This proposal was maybe even more surprising for me than you,” said Čeferin.
“It is not a good idea for the World Cup itself and it’s not a good idea for our qualifiers as well,” he added.
“It is strange that we did not know anything before this proposal at the FIFA Council,” Čeferin said. “I don’t know where it came from.”
FIFA holds its annual congress on May 15 in Paraguay’s capital, Asunción, where Conmebol is headquartered. The agenda for the congress has not yet been released, but you can pretty much guarantee that the proposal for a 64-team World Cup will get aggressive local lobbying in the backrooms, bars and corridors of FIFA.
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