The president of the Spanish league, Javier Tebas, insisted that his “objective is that there are no more Club World Cups” in the future, arguing that FIFA’s new invention by Gianni Infantino with 32 teams affects the football “ecosystem” because “there are no dates”.
Tebas also denounced that the president of FIFA is obsessed with the idea of the main European leagues going from 20 to 18 teams in the first division and that this could “destroy the football industry as we have created it in the last 25 years.”
Why is the president of the Spanish league against the World Cup?
“My goal is for there to be no more Club World Cups. There are no dates, there is no need for another competition that just moves money towards a place, towards a sector of clubs and players. What needs to be done is to eliminate it,” said the president of LaLiga in Spain.
Tebas said about the tournament, where Real Madrid and Atlético de Madrid compete, that “I haven’t seen a single game. I watched some part of Chelsea against Los Angeles and it seemed like a summer friendly. I didn’t see any intensity.”.
According to the highest authority of the two main professional football competitions in Spain, “in accordance with the European Union Court of Justice’s own ruling regarding the Super League, this type of competition cannot be held without the agreement of the stakeholders, including the leagues and the union," he recalled.
In fact, LaLiga, along with other European leagues and the international footballers’ union, filed a lawsuit in the European Union against FIFA for the Club World Cup last year.
The presence of the Madrid teams is already causing a problem for the league, as both teams requested to postpone their debut in the 2025-2026 championship, scheduled for August 15, to have more rest and not give an advantage to the other teams in the tournament. “If they win the Club World Cup, they will earn 120 million and they will come tired... We will see how the other clubs take it,” Tebas warned.
A very different opinion from the president of the Spanish league is held by Florentino Pérez, the president of Real Madrid and political enemy of Tebas, who said that “the first Club World Cup is going to be a success and we all come with that enthusiasm”.
Tebas intensifies his attack against Infantino
In other statements, Tebas stated that FIFA is “obsessed” with having “the big leagues” reduce their number of teams from 20 to 18.
“It’s a topic they have been talking about for years in their forums. Infantino, in fact, has mentioned it in some interviews. It’s an obsession they have, for the top leagues to have 18 clubs. Neither the Premier League, nor Serie A, nor us are going to go down that path," said the president of LaLiga.
According to Tebas, FIFA and Infantino would be looking to reduce the competition dates “so that they can occupy them.”