- President met South American powerbrokers in NYC
- World body would face opposition to 64-team plan
Fifa is not planning to expand the men’s World Cup to 64 teams for the centenary edition of the tournament in 2030, despite its president, Gianni Infantino, meeting a delegation of South America leaders to discuss the idea in New York.
Infantino met the Uruguay and Paraguay heads of state, the president of South American confederation, Conmebol, as well the presidents of the Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay federations at Fifa’s offices in Trump Tower on Tuesday for the first formal discussions about a proposal that was raised informally by the Uruguayan Football Association at a Fifa Council meeting last March.
Fifa’s official position is that it will discuss World Cup expansion with all its stakeholders and that it is duty-bound to consider proposals raised at council. But behind the scenes there is scepticism about whether expanding the tournament to 64 teams is a viable proposition. Next year’s World Cup will be the first to contain 48 teams, while the governing body has broken with convention for 2030 by staging the tournament in six countries on three continents. Paraguay, Uruguay and Argentina will host the first three matches in tribute to the competition’s South American origins in 1930, before the bulk of the tournament moves to Morocco, Spain and Portugal.
Any decision to expand the World Cup would be taken by Fifa Council, which meets in Zurich next month, but that is not on the agenda.
“Gianni would not get that vote through Council even if he wanted to,” a Fifa source said. “The overwhelming feeling around the table – and not just in Europe – is that 64 teams would damage the World Cup. There’d be too many uncompetitive matches and it would risk damaging the business model.”
Conmebol would be the major beneficiaries of another expansion and sources with knowledge of Tuesday’s meeting disclosed that Paraguay, Uruguay and Argentina claimed to have the capability to host all of the group stage.
Expansion to 64 teams would mean more than 30% of Fifa’s 211 member associations would take part, as well as putting all 10 Conmebol in the frame to qualify, up from six direct qualifiers next year, plus the possibility of an extra place via an inter-confederation playoff.
