How the Club World Cup could stretch football’s elite – including Lionel Messi – to breaking point

Even Lionel Messi will not have known a fortnight quite like it.

The man commonly hailed as the greatest footballer of all time could also be the most exhausted by the end of a two-week spell which, if he fulfils all his obligations, could see him clock up almost 10,000 miles and play four games for his club, Inter Miami, and the Argentina national side.

But Messi is not alone. It is 18 months since FIFA told the world of its finer details for a new Club World Cup. A 32-team competition had long been trailed but confirmation of the precise dates from a FIFA Council meeting in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, in December 2023, brought a wince from some with a vested interest.

FIFPro, the global players’ union, said the schedule demonstrated “a lack of consideration for the mental and physical health of participating players” in a blunt statement, while Maheta Molango, chief executive of England’s Professional Footballers’ Association, made his own concerns known.

“This year (2024-25) is when people realise that all of it doesn’t fit,” he told The Athletic in an interview last year. “It’s no longer a question of being a threat that’s coming down the line. It’s here.”

Sandwiched in between club campaigns concluding in Europe this month and the Club World Cup beginning in June is an international break that will see silverware on the line and qualification for the 2026 World Cup finals at stake. Less than a week, in many cases, stands between international commitments finishing and the Club World Cup beginning.

A month from now there will be players and coaches wondering what to do, juggling workloads with self-interest. The Athletic examines the new squeeze on football’s calendar.

The season is almost done in Europe but what’s that coming over the hill?

It’s congestion.

Just as it does in September, October, November and March, FIFA’s international match calendar reserves a spot at the start of June for international games to be played. Next month is no different. All FIFA confederations — UEFA (Europe), AFC (Africa), Concacaf (North, Central America and the Caribbean) and CONMEBOL (South America) — with the exception of OFC (Oceania) and CAF (Asia), have 2026 World Cup qualifiers scheduled, with the latest finishing on June 10.

The issue this year is the Club World Cup. FIFA’s new competition will kick off in Miami on June 14 and run all the way through until July 13. The group stages alone will not finish until June 26, with some stellar names facing new demands in a summer that would have traditionally granted greater downtime.

Nations such as Brazil, Argentina, Netherlands, South Korea, and Saudi Arabia all have World Cup qualifying fixtures on June 10, the final day of the international window, four days before the start of the Club World Cup.

Significantly, the Club World Cup also clashes with the Concacaf Gold Cup (June 14 to July 6), which is also hosted in the United States, as well as Canada. UEFA’s European Under-21 Championship (June 11-28) is another double booking in the schedule.

Who could be affected?

As well as players experiencing tight turnarounds from World Cup qualifiers in the days before the Club World Cup starts, some might be denied the opportunity to feature for their countries.

Included in the regulations for the Club World Cup, published in October 2024, was an exception to FIFA’s Regulations on the Status and Transfer of Players (RTSP) that outlined where the power would lie.

“It is not mandatory for clubs participating in the competition to release their registered players to the representatives of teams of the country for which those players are eligible to play,” it said in article 22.5.

That, it was made clear, did not include the international window running from June 2-10 but gave clubs the ability to make sure their players could not be deemed ineligible due to international call-ups. FIFA, too, has safeguarded the prestige of its new club competition, ensuring the best players are not taken elsewhere.

That means USMNT, Canada and Mexico, all competing in the Concacaf Gold Cup, could be missing many players, including Weston McKennie (Juventus/USMNT) and Gerardo Arteaga (Monterrey/Mexico).

The same will apply for those who ordinarily might have been part of the European Under-21 Championship. Manchester City’s Rico Lewis (England), Chelsea’s Malo Gusto (France), Porto’s Rodrigo Mora (Portugal) and others will have schedules dictated by their clubs, who could theoretically decide their development would be better served at the Euros.

What’s the potential travel itinerary going to look like?

Messi is just one extreme example of the schedule that potentially awaits some of the world’s elite players.

In theory, the 37-year-old could travel from Inter Miami’s home of Chase Stadium, Fort Lauderdale, after playing the Columbus Crew in the MLS on June 1, to Chile for an international fixture with Argentina on June 5.

It’s then on to his home country to host Colombia on June 10 before heading back to Florida to play Al Ahly at the Hard Rock Stadium, Miami on June 14. It adds up to four games in 14 days, with around 9,500 miles of travel thrown in for good measure.

Messi is used to gruelling schedules (he played four games in 19 days, albeit with far less travel in between, last June) and he may be reassured by the suggestions that Argentina, who have already booked their place at the 2026 World Cup and are already missing some senior players due to suspensions, may choose not to call up more established stars. With this in mind, head coach Lionel Scaloni is likely to use those two fixtures to look at younger players.

Lionel Messi is in for a busy summer (Rich Lam/Getty Images)

But for others, especially those based in Europe, there are no such consolations.

After Real Madrid’s final La Liga fixture, currently scheduled for May 25, Vinicius Junior and Rodrygo will then make a 5,500-mile trip to Ecuador, who Brazil face in a World Cup qualifier on June 5. From Ecuador, it’s another 2,500 miles to Sao Paulo for a home game against Paraguay; finally, there’s a 4,000-mile flight to Miami for Madrid’s Club World Cup opener against Al Hilal on June 18.

Inter’s epic Champions League semi-final win over Barcelona will see Benjamin Pavard and Marcus Thuram face the prospect of playing a final in Munich on May 31 before, most likely, being part of France’s attempts to lift the UEFA Nations League, with a semi-final against Spain on June 5 and a potential final on June 8. All before Inter begin their Club World Cup campaign against Monterrey in California on June 17.

A number of England’s squad are also set to feature at the Club World Cup just after Thomas Tuchel’s second camp in charge. England play a World Cup qualifier against Andorra at Espanyol’s RCDE Stadium on June 7 before a friendly with Senegal on June 10 the Nottingham Forest’s City Ground.

The likes of Harry Kane (Bayern Munich), Jude Bellingham (Real Madrid) and Cole Palmer (Chelsea) will all then be part of the Club World Cup a matter of days later.

FIFA’s rules for this summer’s event stipulate that all teams must arrive at their chosen training bases in the U.S. “no fewer than three days before their opening match”.

Do the workload concerns persist or have those been allayed?

The battle lines have been drawn and are not going anywhere. That was best illustrated by the two separate legal challenges launched last year, with FIFA’s scheduling of the Club World Cup considered the tipping point in a long-running debate focused on the workloads of elite players.

Last June saw two of Europe’s biggest players unions, the English PFA and its French counterparts, the Union Nationale des Footballeurs Professionnels, join forces to launch a case against FIFA, arguing the rights of its members were being violated under European Union (EU) laws. In October, it was the turn of FIFPro and the European Leagues, who represent 39 leagues in 33 countries, to file a complaint to the European Commission to protect the welfare of its players.

Those challenges continue to rumble on and underline seemingly irreconcilable differences between stakeholders.

FIFA argues that its new tournament aligns with unchanged attempts to “protect the overall interests of world football… at all levels of the game” and has accused major European leagues opposed to the Club World Cup of acting with “hypocrisy and self-interest”.

FIFA has also consistently stressed that the football calendar, one that will run until 2030, was decided in consultation with all stakeholders, including player unions, before it was signed off.

FIFPro, among others, disagrees. It sees no room for the Club World Cup to be played every four years, especially given the expansion of other leading competitions, including the Champions League and World Cup, which will be a 48-team event for the first time next summer.

Last month, data from FIFPro and Football benchmark suggested players headed to the Club World Cup would be among the most overworked.

In figures updated to April 1, they outlined that Benfica’s Turkey international Kerem Akturkoglu had already played 55 games this season, while estimating that Federico Valverde, of Real Madrid and Uruguay, could eventually take part in 78 games this season. The highest figure possible for Valverde has since fallen to 73 but the 26-year-old has already made 62 appearances for club and country since starting the European Super Cup final on August 14.

Kerem Akturkoglu was cited in a FIFPro study on workload (Ahmad Mora/Getty Images)

The concern is also for the long-term prospects of elite players. The 2025-26 Premier League season starts on August 16, less than five weeks after the final of the Club World Cup. A two-week break could be all that players can realistically expect should their team go all the way.

Any reluctance of clubs to participate has at least eased in the light of FIFA’s distribution packages. A total purse of $1billion (£750,000) will be up for grabs among the 32 teams, with the eventual winners standing to make $125million.

Are there any other concerns ahead of the tournament?

Some of the biggest fears, primarily around the delay in signing a television rights deal, have been largely allayed. The tournament will be broadcast on DAZN, with sublicensing agreements in place for other countries, including Channel 5 in the United Kingdom.

Several commercial deals have also been secured, albeit some — such as those with brewers AB InBev, electronics firm Hisense, soft drinks manufacturers Coca-Cola and financial services giants Visa — are already partners with FIFA.

The Athletic has also reported about concerns within the U.S. government about the prospect of hundreds of thousands of visa applications ahead of the Club World Cup, and many more for the 2026 World Cup.

Speaking in relation to the 2026 World Cup, Vice President J.D. Vance said on Tuesday: “I know we’ll have visitors probably from close to 100 countries. We want them to come, we want them to celebrate, we want them to watch the game. But when the time is up, they’ll have to go home, otherwise they’ll have to talk to Secretary (of Homeland Security Kristi) Noem.”

(Top photo: Lionel Messi; Megan Briggs/Getty Images)

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