The draw for the new Club World CupThe FIFA Club World Cup, expanded next year from seven to thirty-two teams and held in the United States, will take place on December 5 in Miami, Fifa announced on Monday. The date was all the more eagerly awaited as many questions still surround this competition, whose revenues and spin-offs for the clubs remain a mystery: its TV broadcasters are not known and only one sponsor has been revealed, the Chinese group Hisense.

Now scheduled for December 5 from 1:00 pm local time (6:00 pm GMT), the draw will determine the eight groups of four teams that will contest the first phase of the tournament. The 16 clubs finishing in the top two places in each group will qualify for the knockout phase, from the Round of 16 to the final, with no match for third place.

Competition criticized

All the qualifiers for this quadrennial tournament, the first of which will take place from June 15 to July 13 2025 in twelve American stadiums, will be known by then: all that’s missing at the moment is the winner of the Copa Libertadores, whose 100% Brazilian final will pit Atletico Mineuro against Botafogo de Futebol e Regatas on November 30.

Desired since late 2016 by Fifa boss Gianni Infantino, the new competition has also come up against numerous critics given the already overcrowded calendar. At the end of July, the players’ union Fifpro and the Association of World Leagues announced their intention to take Fifa to the European Commission.

In September, Spain’s newly-crowned Ballon d’Or winner Rodri said that footballers were “close” to a strike. The current calendar, “in my humble opinion, it’s too much”, he insisted, even before including the new Club World Cup, in which his team, Manchester City, are due to take part.