World football governing body, FIFA has announced China will host the very first edition of the new expanded Club World Cup in 2021.
FIFA has announced that the next two editions of the current club world cup format will be hosted by Qatar ahead of the World Cup in 2022 with the 2019 competition beginning on December 11 with 2018/2019 Champions League winners Liverpool the favorites to win it.
The FIFA Club World Cup competition, which currently features seven teams — the winner from each confederation’s major continental tournament — will be expanded to 24 teams for the first time in 2021 according to new FIFA rules
The new format will feature eight European teams, six from South America, three from each of Africa, Asia and North and Central America and one from Oceania and will begin in June 2021 and the competition will run every four years from June to July, taking the place on the FIFA calendar currently occupied by the Confederations Cup, which is also being scrapped.
FIFA President Gianni Infantino confirmed that China, had been the only candidate to host the competition.
“It is a historic decision for football,” FIFA President Gianni Infantino said, speaking at a FIFA council meeting in Shanghai. “The new [tournament] will be a competition which anyone who loves football is looking forward to. It is the first real and true Club World Cup where the best clubs will compete.
“It will allow us to generate significant revenues but I want to underline this, very, very clearly … FIFA will have zero out of this because we will reinvest this in football.”
