The FIFA Club World Cup is no longer an adequate measure to decide the best club team in the world.
Due to the huge investments in European football in the last decade, the European (UEFA) clubs have a huge economic advantage over the rest of the world and can buy the best players, which gives them a huge advantage over the other confederations. Also, the format of the tournament favors UEFA and South America (Conmebol), which is unfair to the other teams.
The problem is that the competition has not been able to keep up with the changes in the game and has therefore lost its relevance and purpose.
OBJECTIVE OF THE TOURNAMENT
The competition started in 2000 (when it absorbed its predecessor, the Intercontinental Cup) and was formed as an annual competition to showcase the best local talent from the various confederations. The idea was that the winners of each continental tournament would compete against each other with the winner being crowned the best club team in the world. This was the theory but in practice it has turned out differently.
Previously, the best non-European players followed their careers in their home countries and were unknown to foreign audiences. The Club World Cup gave these players the chance to showcase their skills on the world stage and at the time there was parity between clubs in Europe and South America.
Conmebol teams won the trophy in the first three years of the competition, but after that, European teams dominated and the balance of power shifted towards Europe.
DAVID vs. GOLIATH
The beginning of European domination coincided at the beginning of the current century with a massive influx of investment in football from UEFA at the club level. The consequence of this is that today there is a great disparity in income between European clubs and the other confederations.
The winner of the European Champions League earns much more money than all other continental tournaments combined. Real Madrid earned $70.1 million last season for winning the UEFA Champions League. In contrast, San Lorenzo earned $6.1 million for winning the Copa Libertadores (Conmebol), ES Setie earned $1.8 million for winning the African Champions League (CAF) and in Asia, Western Sydney Wanderers earned almost the same for defeating Al Hilal of Saudi Arabia in two legs (YAHOO SPORTS – Why the Club World Cup Still Struggles to Be Relevant; by Peter Staunton, December 12, 2014).
With so much money available, the best talent money can buy is in Europe’s big leagues, attracted by the lucrative contracts these leagues have to offer. This means that Europe has at its disposal its own talent and that of the rest of the world.
The biggest losers in the exodus of soccer talent to Europe are Brazil and Argentina, which are the main exporters of players, so what Europe gains is what South America loses.
Consequently, all the other teams in the Club World Cup are at a disadvantage compared to the champion of the European Champions League. The tournament has evolved from a rivalry to a David vs. Goliath battle, between European clubs represented by what amounts to a World XI made up primarily of the best international players and minnows, comprising what is left after the best of their talent has been siphoned off by the big UEFA clubs.
The reigning champion, Real Madrid, is a combination of some of the best and most expensive international players hailing from Spain (Casillas and Sergio Ramos), France (Benzema and Varane), Portugal (Ronaldo and Pepe), Germany (Kroos), Brazil (Marcelo), Colombia (RodrÃquez), Wales (Basel) and Mexico (Chicharito). This assembly of players is not very representative of the local game in Spain. For three players, namely Cristiano Ronaldo, Gareth Bale and James RodrÃguez, the club paid $367.8 million. Only twelve clubs in the world have a squad of players whose market value is higher than the total cost of these three.
Compare that to Auckland City FC, one of their competitors in this year’s Club World Cup, which is a team of simple fans with full-time occupations outside of football.
A look at some of the past champions reveals the strong foreign component of their squads. In 2010, when Inter Milan (Italy) won the cup, only 5 players in their squad of 23 were Italian, while the rest were mostly South American. Even TV commentators did not keep up with the changes, as the Inter team were still referred to as ‘the Italians’.
In 2011 Barcelona won the cup and 10 of their 23-man squad were foreigners.
STRANGE FORMAT
Another big problem with the tournament is that the UEFA and South American teams have direct access to the semi-finals and start playing even after some of the teams have been eliminated. This is intentionally done so that only the biggest clubs meet in the final. So far, only teams from those two continents have won and only one team from outside has reached the final, namely last year’s surprise finalist TP Mazembe, a Congolese team.
Given the economic advantage enjoyed by UEFA and the strange format currently in place, the Club World Cup can hardly be called the fairest of competitions and the winner cannot legitimately be called “the best in the world” any more than the winners of the first Intercontinental Cup that was limited to UEFA and Conmebol. The tournament has lost its importance and is hardly worth bragging about. A few years ago I won a dance contest, but the other contestants couldn’t dance, so was my victory something to brag about?
Some parity needs to be restored to the competition. Brazil and Argentina have started raising salaries in their local leagues to entice their players to stay at home. That’s a start, but on top of that, FIFA needs to limit the number of foreign players available to each team to, say, two and change the format so that all competing teams play the same number of qualifying matches. Otherwise, there is no point in continuing the competition in its current form.
Victor A. Dixon
December 23, 2014
