September 6 – The World Leagues Association (WLA) has maintained pressure on FIFA over the increase in matches in the international match calendar saying the recently released ‘Player Workload Monitoring Report 2024’ highlights an “unsustainable trend”.
The Fifpro report documents the demands on players of increased match commitments with the 2025 Club World Cup in particular being identified by player union representative as a ‘tipping point’ in terms of their welfare.
“While the international calendar post-2024 makes it increasingly challenging for national leagues to manage theircompetitions, this report further demonstrates the excessive demands it imposes on players,” said the WLA statement.
The WLA is in lock-step with Fifpro on its position regarding the international match calendar and has launched its own legal action against FIFA who are separately facing legal opposition from Fifpro.
“The WLA is disappointed that decisions regarding the international match calendar adopted by FIFA have been made without the involvement of those representing players and national leagues and are driven by the purpose of adding more international fixtures,” said the WLA statement.
“The recent legal actions initiated by leagues and player unions across Europe underscore the lack of a fair and inclusive decision-making process at international level.
“The WLA will remain committed to engaging in a constructive dialogue to reassess decisions made at the internationallevel and to developing a transparent process that involves all football stakeholders in the best interests of the game.”
While the WLA and Fifpro have called for the suspension of the expanded 2025 Club World Cup, FIFA yesterday unveiled the branding for its new competition, though other detail regarding the logisitics and organisation have been limited. There are now 30 qualified clubs for the 32-team tournament. They will all want more security in terms of their own planning as to how this new competition will shape up.
There is also the issue of where the finance for the new competition will come from with FIFA yet to announce sponsors or broadcasters. An underpinning broadcast discussion with Apple fell through prompting speculation in the US that the tournament would be shelved.
FIFA has some fast footwork to do both organizationally, politically, commercially and legally if they are to pull this off.
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