Ferran Soriano, the chief executive of the company that owns Manchester City, is in favour of a revamped and expanded Club World Cup – so long as players are not obliged to play any more matches than they presently do.
Real Madrid won a third successive Fifa Club World Cup when they beat Al Ain 4-1 in the final in Abu Dhabi last month.
The competition seems set to be the last one to be played in the seven-team, knockout guise, with Fifa planning to restructure the event to involve a greater number of teams and fixtures.
The game’s ruling body are considering a 24-team tournament, played every four years, possibly starting in 2021, involving up to 12 teams from Europe.
Soriano, who is the chief executive of City Football Group, which administers six clubs including English champions Manchester City, said a new global club event is “logical”.
“In principal and conceptually, having a global, worldwide club competition makes sense,” Soriano said, speaking at the Dubai International Sports Conference on Wednesday.
“Improving this format and changing it for the best seems logical. There are all sorts of political issues because the world of football is global, it is a big family, and among the members of the family there are different interests, and they have merit. [But] if we play more games, we have to take games off.
“The players cannot play more games. I know sometimes, from a fan’s perspective it seems like the life of a football player is a great life, but they work a lot. They are under a lot of pressure.
“They have, if they are lucky, four or five weeks of rest through the year. There are many other sports where players rest for two or three months.”
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Read more on Club World Cup
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Santiago Solari impressed by 'remarkable' Al Ain as he celebrates Real Madrid's Fifa Club World Cup win
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Zvonimir Boban, the deputy secretary of Fifa, expects a decision on the format of the event to be made in March.
“In the initial consultation phase we made a few errors, political errors, without meaning to do so,” Boban, the former Croatia and AC Milan player, said.
“Now we are correcting everything. Fifa has an obligation and duty to think about the clubs. Fifa in the past has been accused of not thinking about the clubs.
“Now we would like to offer something to the clubs on a global stage, because they are global brands and the real families of football.”
The reshaping of the Club World Cup would mean an end to the Confederations Cup, according to Boban.
“This World Cup for the clubs is a very strange one, and we have a Confederations Cup, which should be cancelled in the case that we organise the new one,” Boban said.
“Having a quadrennial tournament, we believe will be something good for football, very entertaining, a top competition.”
_____________
Read more on Dubai International Sports Conference:
Gianni Infantino: Fifa exploring idea of Gulf countries helping Qatar stage expanded 48-team World Cup
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Gianni Infantino, the Fifa president, said the World Cup remains the “most powerful” competition in football, and he wants the club version to be more closely aligned to it.
“Fifa today has a Club World Cup already, but it is not really anything close to what the national teams’ World Cup is,” Infantino said.
“In the Club World Cup, we should have the best players of the world participating, and they play for the best clubs.
“Clubs are multinational. Here in Dubai, everyone talks to me about Mohamed Salah. He plays for Liverpool. He is not from the Emirates, he is from Egypt, which is on another continent.
“But it shows that club football has as an impact worldwide, and I think we need to do something to ensure we have true competition.”
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Director: Anne Fletcher
Stars: Bette Midler, Sarah Jessica Parker, Kathy Najimy
Rating: 3.5/5
Company Profile
Name: HyveGeo
Started: 2023
Founders: Abdulaziz bin Redha, Dr Samsurin Welch, Eva Morales and Dr Harjit Singh
Based: Cambridge and Dubai
Number of employees: 8
Industry: Sustainability & Environment
Funding: $200,000 plus undisclosed grant
Investors: Venture capital and government
From Europe to the Middle East, economic success brings wealth - and lifestyle diseases
A rise in obesity figures and the need for more public spending is a familiar trend in the developing world as western lifestyles are adopted.
One in five deaths around the world is now caused by bad diet, with obesity the fastest growing global risk. A high body mass index is also the top cause of metabolic diseases relating to death and disability in Kuwait, Qatar and Oman – and second on the list in Bahrain.
In Britain, heart disease, lung cancer and Alzheimer’s remain among the leading causes of death, and people there are spending more time suffering from health problems.
The UK is expected to spend $421.4 billion on healthcare by 2040, up from $239.3 billion in 2014.
And development assistance for health is talking about the financial aid given to governments to support social, environmental development of developing countries.
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1. End poverty in all its forms everywhere
2. End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture
3. Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages
4. Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all
5. Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls
6. Ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all
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8. Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all
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11. Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable
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13. Take urgent action to combat climate change and its effects
14. Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development
15. Protect, restore and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems, sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, and halt and reverse land degradation and halt biodiversity loss
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UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus
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Console: PlayStation 2 to 5
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Company Profile
Company name: Namara
Started: June 2022
Founder: Mohammed Alnamara
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Sector: Microfinance
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Investment stage: Series A
Investors: Family offices
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- High fever
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If symptoms occur, they usually last for two-seven days
RESULT
Al Hilal 4 Persepolis 0
Khribin (31', 54', 89'), Al Shahrani 40'
Red card: Otayf (Al Hilal, 49')
The First Monday in May
Director: Andrew Rossi
Starring: Anna Wintour, Karl Lagerfeld, John Paul Gaultier, Rihanna
Three stars
SPECS
Engine: 1.5-litre turbo
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COMPANY PROFILE
Company name: Almouneer
Started: 2017
Founders: Dr Noha Khater and Rania Kadry
Based: Egypt
Number of staff: 120
Investment: Bootstrapped, with support from Insead and Egyptian government, seed round of
$3.6 million led by Global Ventures
The five pillars of Islam
COMPANY PROFILE
Name: SmartCrowd
Started: 2018
Founder: Siddiq Farid and Musfique Ahmed
Based: Dubai
Sector: FinTech / PropTech
Initial investment: $650,000
Current number of staff: 35
Investment stage: Series A
Investors: Various institutional investors and notable angel investors (500 MENA, Shurooq, Mada, Seedstar, Tricap)
Kandahar
Director: Ric Roman Waugh
Stars: Gerard Butler, Navid Negahban, Ali Fazal
Rating: 2.5/5
Kill
Director: Nikhil Nagesh Bhat
Starring: Lakshya, Tanya Maniktala, Ashish Vidyarthi, Harsh Chhaya, Raghav Juyal
Rating: 4.5/5
South Africa squad
Faf du Plessis (captain), Hashim Amla, Temba Bavuma, Quinton de Kock (wicketkeeper), Theunis de Bruyn, AB de Villiers, Dean Elgar, Heinrich Klaasen (wicketkeeper), Keshav Maharaj, Aiden Markram, Morne Morkel, Wiaan Mulder, Lungi Ngidi, Vernon Philander and Kagiso Rabada.
The Genius of Their Age
Author: S Frederick Starr
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Pages: 290
Available: January 24
Honeymoonish
Director: Elie El Samaan
Starring: Nour Al Ghandour, Mahmoud Boushahri
Rating: 3/5
A QUIET PLACE
Starring: Lupita Nyong'o, Joseph Quinn, Djimon Hounsou
Director: Michael Sarnoski
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Herc's Adventures
Developer: Big Ape Productions
Publisher: LucasArts
Console: PlayStation 1 & 5, Sega Saturn
Rating: 4/5
COMPANY PROFILE
Company name: Bedu
Started: 2021
Founders: Khaled Al Huraimel, Matti Zinder, Amin Al Zarouni
Based: Dubai, UAE
Industry: AI, metaverse, Web3 and blockchain
Funding: Currently in pre-seed round to raise $5 million to $7 million
Investors: Privately funded
