Club World Cup Schedule Released – Does Anyone Care?

By: chris | November 12th, 2009

fifaclubworldcup2008_155074 I’ll be frank: I don’t. I think it’s a ridiculous competition with nice ideals, but one which falls short due to that which has felled many a great idea in history: theory does not always translate well to practice.

Such as it promotes itself as a legitimate competition with integrity and meaning – the club equivalent of the World Cup, if we’re to take the name at face value – when the setup and weighted system renders it an absolute joke. It’s essentially the club version of the Confederations Cup, but more intrusive and without the added motivation to dry run for the impending World Cup.

A few reasons as to why we shouldn’t care:

i. We all know that Europe and South America hold the strongest federations, with Asia stampeding behind in third with all sorts of resources at the ready. But Brazil and Italy don’t waltz into World Cup knockouts with group stage byes simply due to their superior World Cup trophy hauls, perceived quality or confederation coefficient. Make it even across the board. If Europe and South America are so good, they’ll get there anyway.

ii. It shouldn’t be held in the same place multiple years as though it’s a friendly tournament. Let a different city around the world, switching continents much like the real thing, throw a gala each year. In the process give the city a reason to put on a show, people to watch a city put on a show and fans a reason to travel to the site rather than look at pictures of last year’s trip to Tokyo or the UAE.

iii. Legitimate competitions also shouldn’t have ‘fifth place’ matches. This isn’t u7. Not everyone is a winner, not everyone deserves a trophy and not everyone deserves orange slices at halftime. I’m not even entirely sure a six team competition should have a third placed match. No need for a ranking system here: there’s a winner and then everybody else.

iv. If it’s so necessarily important, create an international break for it and cease interrupting in-season competitions. I’m no fan of extra int’l breaks, but it solves a host of scheduling issues and doesn’t force clubs into ridiculous fixture sandwiches later in the campaign.

All with fairly simple solutions and all reasons why you shouldn’t care.

But if you do care, this is what the schedule looks like:

Playing on Dec. 9 Al Ahli (UAE) v Auckland City (New Zealand)
Playing on Dec. 11 TP Mazembe (DR Congo) v Pohang Steelers (South Korea)
Playing on Dec. 12 Ah Ahli/Auckland City v Atlante (Mexico)
Playing on Dec. 15 TP Mazembe/Pohang Steelers v Estudiantes (Argentina)
Playing on Dec. 16 Ah Ahli/Auckland City/Atlante v Barcelona (Spain)
Dec. 16, Fifth place match
Dec. 19, Third place match
Dec. 19, Final