© Jessica Alcheh/Imagn
The FIFA World Cup is one of the best events in all of sports. Every four years, the world comes together to crown the best soccer nation on the planet. It features not only incredible feats of athleticism, but also remarkable drama, passion and culture. It’s all of the things that makes us fall in love with sports.
And yet, for several years now, FIFA has done everything it can to ruin its premier event.
It began with selling the tournament to the highest bidder rather than countries that are most-equipped to host and are genuinely passionate about the sport. That’s how we ended up with a winter World Cup in Qatar in 2022. Then FIFA saw a way to make even more money by expanding the field from 32 teams to 48 for the 2026 World Cup in North America. The change added extra teams and extra games, but took almost all the drama out of qualifying and will almost assuredly create more blowouts.
But wait, there’s more!
FIFA Delegate Proposes Ridiculous 64-Team World Cup Format In 2030
Because 48 teams and extra rounds does not make FIFA enough money, the governing body exploring expanding the tournament to a ridiculous 64 teams in 2030. FIFA claims that the proposed change meant to simply celebrate the centenary event. But given its history and its past tweaks, that seems unlikely.
“A proposal to analyze a 64-team FIFA World Cup to celebrate the centenary of the FIFA World Cup in 2030 was spontaneously raised by a FIFA Council member in the ‘miscellaneous’ agenda item near the end of the FIFA Council meeting held on March 5, 2025,” a FIFA spokesperson told Reuters. “The idea was acknowledged as FIFA has a duty to analyze any proposal from one of its Council members.”
The good news is while FIFA president Gianni Infantino was seemingly enamored by the idea, several other representatives in the room were less convinced.
An expansion to 64 teams would make qualifying more or less irrelevant. It would also make the event an absolute nightmare to hold in terms of infrastructure, logistics and planning. But when there is money to made, those issues often goes out the door with FIFA. Here’s hoping this ridiculous idea goes out the door as well.