Reporter Han Bing reported that this is a "power struggle" under the guise of "biennial World Cup" to re-divide the share of the world football industry and reorganize the power structure. Since Infantino proposed a plan to completely change the world football scene in the 1990s, UEFA, which has always enjoyed the transcendent status of "under FIFA and above the five major football federations", has faced an unprecedented challenge of discourse power and authority.
UEFA, which monopolizes 70% of the world's football economy, will certainly not give in easily. Since the Johansson era, UEFA has continued to expand its participation in the European Championship, and now it has created a new European national league, which has spared no effort to increase the economic share of football. Even if FIFA pays tens of millions of dollars in "dividends" to win the support of the Football Association for underdeveloped football, UEFA is not moved: these small profits are negligible for the future European football economy of the tens of billions of euros.
UEFA is allied with SOUTH AMERICAN FOOTBALL and plans to launch the Euro-South American League in 2024, earlier than the launch of FIFA's Biennial World Cup. FIFA had originally tried to force a vote to approve the "Biennial World Cup" plan at Monday's plenary meeting, but Infantino knew that the opposition of Europe + South America meant that FIFA could only get the majority of the votes, but lost the majority of the football economy, to no avail. FiFA postponed the vote until the end of March next year, while also releasing a 700-page study to try to persuade UEFA to support the "Biennial World Cup".
The power struggle for world football resources and UEFA's defense of its "super voice" has reached the most critical moment.
UEFA's "one-vote veto" is the key
At Monday's FIFA online conference, Infantino officially submitted plans for a biennial World Cup to its 211 football associations. However, contrary to the previous media and FIFA's own expectations, the plan is not to vote at the conference, but to postpone voting until March next year. The reason for the delay in voting is not that FIFA did not have confidence in winning the vote. On the contrary, FIFA President Infantino confirmed media reports that the plan has been supported by 165 football associations, with a support rate of as high as 78%, and that the plan has been passed without any suspense.
But Infantino also admitted that FIFA must have the support of UEFA and SOUTH American Football Federation to truly implement this epoch-making plan. Because UEFA, which has 55 football associations, accounts for 70% of the income of the world football economy, coupled with the share of South American Football Federation, the two major football federations "boycott" two years to hold a World Cup, the World Cup from the economy has become a minority, losing the significance of worldwide representation. FIFA's top priority is to do everything from increasing revenue expectations to reducing the number of qualifier matches to possible changes to the World Cup format, a three-pronged approach, to dismantle UEFA's opposition from within, and to strive for UEFA's approval with a de facto "one-vote veto".
UEFA took the lead in opposing the "biennial World Cup", on the one hand, it allied with SOUTH American Football Federation, using the Euro-South American League to further increase its share and voice in the world football economy, on the other hand, it threw out the assessment report of Oliver & Ohlbaum Consulting, concluding that the biennial World Cup will bring a huge loss of 250 million to 3 billion euros in a four-year cycle to European Football Associations. In November, the World League Forum also released a report from another consulting firm, concluding that if the World Cup and Club World Cup expansions are fully realized, europa league and UEFA losses will be close to $9 billion per season.
UEFA and COMO played the trump card of "starting another" self-organized event and expected loss of revenue, "vetoing" the feasibility of a biennial World Cup from the authoritative and economic point of view of the event. In addition to the fundamental economic damage, UEFA is worried that the world cup will be changed to a biennial event that will affect or even force continents to cancel their continental events. After all, the new plan will inevitably change the national cups on all continents to be held in odd-numbered years, resulting in a situation where there are competitions for at least 3 years in a 4-year cycle. Europe's major leagues, clubs and players' unions, which already have an absolute say in the economy, will not accept such an intensive national team competition. And once the Nations Cup of nations on all continents disappears, UEFA will lose the European Cup, the biggest capital that rivals FIFA, which is absolutely impossible for UEFA to accept. Because it means that European football loses its independence.
FIFA still plays the economic card
In order to persuade UEFA from the basis of economic interests, FIFA also threw out its own assessment report. Nielsen Consulting's 700-page report came to the exact opposite conclusion: Revenue from a four-year World Cup of $7 billion will increase to $11.4 billion after a biennial, with revenue surging 62 percent over a four-year World Cup cycle. FIFA will set aside $3.5 billion of the $4.4 billion increase as a "solidarity fund", with each of its FA receiving $16 million, $7 million more than the current share. This is of course tempting enough for the underdeveloped football federations in Asia, Africa, central and north America, even in Europe and South America, small and medium-sized football associations such as Gibraltar, faroe Islands, Andorra, bolivia and so on will inevitably not be moved.
Infantino stressed that UEFA currently accounts for 70% of the world's football revenue, and the remaining five major football federations account for only 30%. However, in the increase in revenue from the two-year World Cup, UEFA's actual revenue will still increase by $2 billion or more. Most importantly, most of the new income will subsidize the Football Association in underdeveloped football areas, helping to narrow the gap between the rich and the poor in world football. This point still has a certain effect on the differentiation of the small and medium-sized football associations that occupy at least 2/3 of the 55 football associations in UEFA. FIFA also stressed the impact of hosting the World Cup every two years on the economies of various countries, which will increase global GDP by $80 billion and add 2 million jobs worldwide in the next 16 years, which in turn puts pressure on UEFA at the national level.
In addition, FIFA has drastically reduced the number of international match days, reducing them to two windows (March and October) or even one window (October) each year, with 28 days dedicated to qualifiers, relieving leagues, clubs and players' unions of countries from worrying about excessive fatigue of players due to too many matches. As for the economic aspects of the five major leagues and the Champions League, FIFA's answer is also shocking: the revenue of Europe's top leagues is directly proportional to the World Series year, not inversely proportional. In the past 10 years, the revenue growth of the five major leagues has been higher in the competition year (42%), which is significantly better than in the year without the competition (26%).
FIFA's economic account has reached this point, and even concessions may be made in the format. The president of the China North american football federation has revealed that in the year of the World Cup that collided with the national cups of various continents, the qualifiers may be greatly reduced, and it is not ruled out that the invitation system + qualifier system based on the results of the previous World Cup is used as the standard. Traditional strong teams may be directly in the final round, which looks more like the 48-team version of the Confederations Cup. Of course, such a format reinforces UEFA's concerns, as it is tantamount to announcing the demise of the nations cups of all continents.
The next 3 months will be the key to the game
In addition to "inducements", Infantino also played the "moral" card of unity: "Of the 7 billion people in the world, only 500 million live in Europe." The Biennial World Cup could boost the development of another 6.5 billion people in their regions. Europe should be a pioneer in bridging the gap between rich and poor in the football world, not the other way around. But UEFA and COMO have publicly opposed the "biennial World Cup", with particular emphasis on devaluing the most important games on the planet, reducing the quality of matches and undermining their 4-year cycle tradition.
In fact, the FIFA report notes that the "biennial World Cup" will increase the World Cup's revenue to $11.4 billion, but the actual World Cup is only $5.7 billion per World Cup, compared to the previous World Cup's 7 billion euros, which is actually a nearly 20% reduction. This is a numbers game that uses the total amount of two cups to mask the decline in the commercial value of individual cups. After all, it is still unknown whether the "Biennial World Cup" can attract more young people to football, as Infantino said. Elite events such as the Champions League and the five major leagues once a year have not changed the trend of young people getting farther and farther away from the stadium and addicted to mobile phone screens.
More fiercely contested than economic interests is on matchdays. It's not just FIFA and UEFA that are competing for matchdays that can directly bring more revenue – the professional leagues are also competing for matchdays. The conflict between the club and FIFA and UEFA on match days will further exacerbate the contradictions, and everyone wants to occupy more and better match days.
The competition for interests and discourse rights between FIFA, UEFA and club giants will definitely not stop naturally. UEFA has expanded the size of European club and national team competitions, taking advantage of the opportunity, FIFA, although it has the support of THE Asian, African and North American Football Federation, but it is not possible to maintain the commercial value of the World Cup in the context of the boycott of European and South American national teams. Therefore, the game in the next 3 months is the key to determining the transformation of the world football pattern.