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Arsène Wenger has endorsed the plans for an expanded FIFA Club World Cup from 2025 onwards, saying the revamped competition will help “make football really global” while downplaying concerns about player welfare.
Wenger, who managed Arsenal in the Premier League from 1996 to 2018, is now FIFA’s chief of global football development.
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“The positive impact that this [the Club World Cup] will have on clubs is going to be huge, because it will increase resources for clubs all over the world to develop and to compete,” Wenger said on Tuesday.
“In Europe we are lucky, but it’s important that we make football really global and this creates a chance for other clubs to progress, this is the real target.”
On Sunday, FIFA president Gianni Infantino confirmed plans for the first edition of the revised tournament, set to last 29 days in the summer of 2025 and be hosted in the United States.
The competition will include 32 teams, increased from the seven competing in the ongoing edition, with 12 of those sides coming from Europe. It will be played every four years.
News of the new tournament has not been entirely well-received by players and managers alike, with Bernardo Silva sharing his thoughts on the potential impact of stars playing too much football at the Monday news conference ahead of his Manchester City team’s Club World Cup semifinal with Urawa Reds.
“I am not going to lie, sometimes I feel tired,” said Silva. “All of us, we feel tired for some games because we play every three days.
“We don’t rest. We have no Christmas, we have no summer. But that’s the price you pay for being at a top club and fighting for all competitions. At the end our dream was to play at this level.
“But I say this because of the rest players get, because the risk of injuries goes up quite a lot. At the end we play because we earn a lot of money. But, in my opinion, for the people who love the game and are entertained by the game, if we have this many games for so long then they will lose the energy and the intensity.”
Silva’s comments echo those of Real Madrid‘s Dani Carvajal and Carlo Ancelotti — with the former saying players would be open to taking a pay cut if it meant playing fewer games.
Wenger said these concerns about increased workload fail to take into account the improvements in modern sports science, and insisted FIFA had considered welfare when devising the amendments to the Club World Cup.
“I accept that the football calendar is a busy one, but this is a competition that is going to take place every four years and of course the rest period during the competition and afterwards has to be respected. There is demand for big competitions in football, and there has been a good support for this one.
“The welfare of the players in the last 20 years has increased dramatically as well, when you look at injury prevention, recovery work, nutrition and advances in medical technology. It is unrecognisable from what it used to be.
“VAR has helped with the protection of players, as players know they cannot escape from making bad tackles that cause injury. So overall there has been huge improvements on the welfare side, and we want to continue with that progress. We see players receiving world awards, the likes of [Lionel] Messi, [Cristiano] Ronaldo, [Karim] Benzema, all over the age of 35… Not so long ago, that was not possible.”