{"id":41253,"date":"2026-07-31T16:37:40","date_gmt":"2026-07-31T14:37:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/?post_type=news&#038;p=41253"},"modified":"2026-07-31T16:37:40","modified_gmt":"2026-07-31T14:37:40","slug":"fifa-studying-impact-of-expanding-world-cup-to-64-teams-for-2030-edition","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/fifa-studying-impact-of-expanding-world-cup-to-64-teams-for-2030-edition\/","title":{"rendered":"FIFA studying impact of expanding World Cup to 64 teams for 2030 edition"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"x_elementToProof\">FIFA is studying the impact of expanding the World Cup from 48 to 64 teams for the 2030 edition, \u200baccording to a document seen by <i>Reuters.<\/i><\/div>\n<div class=\"x_elementToProof\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"x_elementToProof\">The 2026 edition was \u200cexpanded from 32 to 48 teams, adding four more groups and an extra knockout round in the process.<\/div>\n<div class=\"x_elementToProof\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"x_elementToProof\">South American confederation CONMEBOL had officially proposed hosting the 2030 \u200bWorld Cup with 64 teams last year, allowing more countries the \u200bopportunity to join in the celebrations for the tournament&#8217;s centennial \u2060edition.<\/div>\n<div class=\"x_elementToProof\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"x_elementToProof\">&#8220;FIFA wishes to appoint an independent agency to determine whether and \u200bhow expanding the FIFA World Cup from 48 to 64 participating national \u200bteams, starting with the 2030 edition, would impact on the tournament proposition,&#8221; it said in a research brief.<\/div>\n<div class=\"x_elementToProof\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"x_elementToProof\">The accelerated study comes on the heels of FIFA&#8217;s plan to \u200bcreate a $20-billion subsidiary to run the World Cup and its other events \u200bwith external investors, a move that has attracted criticism and a UEFA decision to boycott \u200cFIFA \u2060events.<\/div>\n<div class=\"x_elementToProof\"><\/div>\n<div>The analysis is meant to assess whether the proposed expansion can strengthen the tournament or whether concerns such as competition dilution, calendar congestion, operational complexity and market saturation outweigh the potential benefits.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div class=\"x_elementToProof\">&#8220;The final recommendation should demonstrate \u200bnot only whether \u200ba 64-team tournament \u2060can generate incremental value, but whether that value is sustainable,&#8221; the document added.<\/div>\n<div class=\"x_elementToProof\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"x_elementToProof\">FIFA said a decision on selecting \u200bthe agency would be made on August 14 and \u200bthey would \u2060have only four weeks to deliver their analysis by September 11.<\/div>\n<div class=\"x_elementToProof\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"x_elementToProof\">The 2030 World Cup is being jointly hosted by Morocco, Portugal and Spain while Argentina, \u2060Paraguay \u200band Uruguay will host one match each \u200bto celebrate the tournament&#8217;s 100th anniversary.<\/div>\n<div class=\"x_elementToProof\"><\/div>\n<div>Reuters has contacted FIFA for comment.<\/div>\n<div class=\"x_elementToProof\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"x_elementToProof\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"x_elementToProof\">&#8211;Reuters-<\/div>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":20527,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"news-type":[20],"class_list":["post-41253","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-sport","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"The 2030 World Cup is being jointly hosted by Morocco, Portugal and Spain.","published_date":"","news_description":"The 2030 World Cup is being jointly hosted by Morocco, Portugal and Spain.","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/41253","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/41253\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":41254,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/41253\/revisions\/41254"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20527"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41253"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=41253"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}