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Chelsea players celebrate next to US President Donald Trump after beating Paris Saint-Germain in the Club World Cup final at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, on July 13, 2025.
Three things we learned from the Club World Cup
On a muggy afternoon in New Jersey yesterday, a London-based, American-owned soccer club beat a Qatari-owned, French-based one to win the Club World Cup final, as Chelsea defeated Paris Saint-Germain 3-0. US President Donald Trump not only watched, but came down to the field for the trophy ceremony himself.
The United States hosted the tournament, which featured the world’s top soccer clubs, as a dress rehearsal for next year’s World Cup, which will pit national teams against each other in matches taking place across the US, Mexico, and Canada. As we look ahead to that tournament, the most-watched sporting event in the world, what did we learn from this year’s club tournament?
Donald Trump will embrace next year’s World Cup.
Just look at the trophy ceremony yesterday: the US leader descended from his box seats to hand the trophy to Chelsea captain Reece James, before standing among the team as they celebrated.
This is surprising to some degree: football is a global sport, and this was a global club tournament where none of the US-based teams advanced to the latter stages. The ticket prices were expensive and most of the games took place on the coasts. The tournament smacked of “globalism” and elitism — two things that sit uneasily with Trump’s America First styling.
But the president is also a born performer who wouldn’t miss a chance to be in the global spotlight.
Looking ahead to next year, expect the US president to cut a large figure in the World Cup tournament, even if that means jilting fellow hosts Canada and Mexico. If things go well, he’ll take the credit. If they don’t, he’ll almost certainly blame the neighbors. And at the very end of it all, don’t be surprised if he tries to throw a red MAGA hat on one of the winning side’s players – remember when the Qatari emir threw a traditional bisht robe on Argentine champion Lionel Messi during the trophy ceremony for the last World Cup in Doha?
This tournament tested the relationship between footballing authorities and the players.
Following the lead of many of the world’s top national football leagues, FIFA, the sports global governing body, wants players to play more and more games. Not only has it vastly expanded the Club World Cup – the tournament used to feature just 7 teams and was 10 days long, whereas this one gathered 32 teams and lasted a month – it has also increased the number of countries in next year’s World Cup to 48, up from 32.
The players are hitting back, voicing concerns about player welfare. It didn’t help that they had to play in the stifling American summer heat, nor that FIFA failed to even invite the players’ union Fifpro to a recent meeting about off-season breaks – the union also slammed the Club World Cup on Monday, as well as its organizers. Certain footballers like England’s Ben White have shunned international duty, and it’s possible that others may follow suit with the brutal schedule.
Could that affect whether some of the games top stars play in the World Cup next year? The world’s most celebrated athletes have labor disputes too.
Finally, international tensions will cloud next year’s tournament.
While the Club World Cup didn’t figure much in most Americans’ daily lives, next year’s tournament between international teams will dominate headlines and cities. The demand for tickets will be vastly higher, and thousands will come to support their teams from abroad.
Yet questions lurk about which fans will be able to attend next year, and which ones will want to attend.
However, Trump recently signed a travel ban that bars citizens from 12 countries from entering the United States. One of those countries is Iran, which has already qualified for the World Cup.
They might not be the only ones either. Haiti and Sudan could also qualify for the World Cup, yet both are on the travel ban list. What’s more, the Trump administration has warned another 36 countries – including likely World Cup qualifiers Egypt, Ivory Coast, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo – that it may add them to the list if they don’t fix certain safety concerns.
FIFA President Gianni Infantino has been working hard to maintain the global aspect of the World Cup. He has also heaped praise on Trump each time he appears at the White House for a soccer-related event – he even attended the president’s second inauguration – as he hopes to keep the US president on board with his plans. With a travel ban already in place, and a possible expansion to follow, Infantino has his work cut out if he wants to keep soccer’s top tournament accessible to its most adoring and committed fans.
Atletico Madrid players and staff hold a banner in support of Spain's Jennifer Hermoso before the match as FIFA suspend President of the Royal Spanish Football Federation Luis Rubiales after the Women's World Cup Final.
Was Rubiales’ kiss sexual assault?
The scandal involving Spanish football federation president Luis Rubiales continues to deepen. More than a week after he planted a kiss on the lips of star forward Jenni Hermoso following Spain’s World Cup win over England, federal prosecutors have launched an investigation into whether the kiss constituted sexual assault.
Since Spain's victory, Rubiales has claimed that it was simply a “peck between two friends celebrating something,” before changing his tune and saying it was “probably a mistake.” Then, on Friday, Rubiales again defended his actions, and the RFEF, Spain’s soccer governing body, issued a statement supporting him and accusing Hermoso of distorting reality.
Rubiales has been suspended for 90 days by Fifa, pending a disciplinary committee probe. Nearly a dozen Spanish coaches have quit, and some of Spain’s players are refusing to play. Meanwhile, Rubiales’ mom, distraught by the allegations against her son, has locked herself in a church and launched a hunger strike amid growing demands that her son be fired.
The Graphic Truth: The World Cup of graft
FIFA, the governing body of world soccer, has long been tainted with corruption scandals — and the 2022 edition of its top competition is no exception. The World Cup is being held in Qatar despite the fact that even FIFA itself "admitted" that bribes were exchanged before the tiny emirate with zero soccer tradition got the nod in late 2010. But what about the countries whose national teams qualified for the tournament? We take a look at how the most and least corrupt countries would play against each other as soccer teams on a pitch. Note: if you're missing Saudi Arabia, believe it or not it ranks as less graft-ridden than Croatia.
A sculpture of the World Cup trophy is pictured in front of Khalifa International Stadium in Doha.
Will politics or soccer win Qatar's World Cup?
Sunday is the day half the world has been eagerly awaiting for four years. The men's soccer World Cup — the most-watched event of the most popular sport on the planet — kicks off in, of all places, Qatar.
Hold up. A World Cup in a tiny country with zero soccer tradition that’s never qualified for the tournament? Yep. And that’s just one reason why, so far, this particular edition has grabbed more headlines over its scandals than the Beautiful Game.
First, Qatar has been called out for its dismal human rights record, especially regarding migrant workers. In February 2021, a bombshell report by The Guardian claimed that more than 6,500 guest laborers from South Asia had died while building the stadiums. (The Qataris, of course, deny it all.)
And then there's how Qatar treats LGBTQ people. Same-sex relationships are strictly banned, transgender people must undergo conversion therapy, and until a couple of months ago LGBTQ people were still being detained for no reason other than, well, being LGBTQ. Doha has tried to downplay it, but the tournament's official ambassador did it no favors when he told German TV that homosexuality is "damage in the mind."
Second, it all reeks of corruption. And that's on both sides: Qatar and FIFA, the governing body of world soccer, with a long and checkered history of being riddled with graft.
Ever since it awarded the 2022 tournament to Qatar — and the 2018 edition to Russia — over higher-merit bids almost 12 years ago, FIFA hasn't been able to shake the widely held suspicion that bribes were taken. The scandal blew wide open in 2015, when the FBI indicted some top officials for running FIFA like a mafia and forced longtime President Sepp Blatter to step down.
But even after FIFA admitted missing red flags like the sizzling temperature, it decided to keep Qatar as host. The consequence? For the first time, the World Cup was rescheduled for the winter months, requiring domestic soccer championships everywhere to take a two-month break in the middle of the season (allegedly) thanks to gas-rich Qatar's deep pockets.
FIFA got away with it because, quite simply, it has too much global sway. Indeed, the political power that comes with deciding who gets to host the most-followed sporting event on the planet cannot be understated.
Qatar, for its part, is using the World Cup to pitch itself as a peace-loving Middle Eastern country that wants to attract more tourism and foreign investment, sell more of its plentiful natural gas, and project more soft power in a notoriously volatile region.
There's been (some) backlash. In the run-up to the tournament, Qatar has become toxic for celebrities. While singers like Rod Stewart or Dua Lipa were praised for turning down hefty sums to headline the opening ceremony, Nicki Minaj got flak for recording the tournament’s theme song following the social media outcry over Qatar's anti-LGBT laws.
Meanwhile, in Europe activist fans have piled on by calling for a boycott. Whether that means not watching in person or not watching at all is unclear, but so far the strongest national team reaction has come from Denmark, whose players will wear "toned-down" uniforms in Qatar.
Yet, despite all the controversy, the vast majority of soccer nuts around the globe will still tune in. Why?
For one thing, it's not the first time a World Cup host has had a dodgy human rights record. After all, Argentina won its first trophy at home in 1978 while the country was run by a fearsome military junta. For another, the political stuff usually stops when the ball starts rolling.
Once the tournament is underway, most fans’ attention will switch quickly from human rights to the human magic expected from the feet of megastars like Leo Messi, Kylian Mbappé, or Neymar. (We'd mention Cristiano Ronaldo too, but he's in a bit of a slump these days.)
So, dear reader, let's kick the question over to you: Will the story of Qatar 2022 be scandal or soccer? And while we're at it, who do you think will win? The smart money seems to be on Argentina and Brazil, but there are plenty of underdogs — hello, Senegal — with a shot at going all the way.
Let us know your thoughts on either here.This was featured in Signal, the daily politics newsletter of GZERO Media. For smart coverage of global affairs that normal people can understand, subscribe here.
US women soccer team’s fight for equal pay "because we're clearly the dominant team"
The World Cup-winning US women's soccer team won its sixth medal (bronze) in the Tokyo Olympics, and it's arguably the world's best squad in recent years. Meanwhile, the national women's team just filed its first brief to appeal an equal pay lawsuit ruling against the US Soccer Federation, one year after a judge rejected their claim that they were underpaid compared to the (way less successful) men's squad. GZERO World gets the latest on what comes next from two-time gold medalist and World Cup champion goalkeeper Briana Scurry and their lawyers.
Watch the episode: Politics, protest & the Olympics: the IOC's Dick Pound