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On Thursday, FIFA presented the proposal of conducting the men's World Cup every two years instead of the current format of every four years. The men's World Cup has been played every four years since 1930 apart from the 12-year break between 1938 and 1950 due to the second World War.
Arsene Wenger, currently FIFA's head of global development, has laid out a plan for a new calendar with a major international tournament every summer and the World Cup, Euros on alternate years. Wenger's plan targets a 2028 window for the biennial World Cup – the same time when Los Angeles is scheduled to host the Summer Olympics and Paralympics. Not so surprisingly, IOC are pretty displeased by Wenger’s decision. The European football league swiftly opposed this proposal.
Wenger said his priorities were less travel for players and less disruption for their clubs plus giving young talent worldwide to playing more meaningful games. About 80 former internationals such as Ronaldo, Jurgen Klinsmann, Roberto Carlos, Dider Drogba, Peter Schmeichel, Tim Cahill went to Qatar for two days of FIFA-hosted talks and emerged with consensus for playing the tournament twice as often. “We all agreed with the new proposal of the calendar,” said Ronaldo. He described FIFA’s proposal was amazing.
“The current calendar, as far as the World Cup is concerned, was conceived almost 100 years ago, and so the world has completely changed since then. I believe that the moment has come for us to evolve with them, with the new generations, the fast-paced information – this is very important for us, and I believe that,” he went on to add. Confederation of African Football had also supported the idea in July.
On the opposing hand, UEFA chief Aleksander Ceferin in an interview said "We can decide not to play in it. As far as I know the South Americans are on the same page, so good luck with a World Cup like that. I think it will never happen as it is so much against the basic principles of football. To play every summer a one-month tournament, for the players it’s a killer,". He said the biennial World Cup would "kill football" and criticised FIFA for going public without proper consultation. Ceferin said holding the World Cup every two years would "lead to more randomisation, less legitimacy and unfortunately, dilute the World Cup itself".
He made it clear UEFA would not introduce a Euros every two years if the new calendar went through. “It might be good for UEFA financially but the problem is we would be killing football like that,” he said. “We are killing the players. I don’t see the clubs allowing the players to go and that would divide us completely." "A biennial World Cup would negatively disrupt the football economy and undermine players' welfare in a calendar that is already overloaded," read a statement by the World Leagues Forum – an association of professional football leagues. European Leagues Board of Directors which has members in Spanish, English, German, Italian, Portuguese, French leagues among others said, "Leagues have firmly and unanimously opposed any proposals to organise the FIFA World Cup every two years.”
World Athletics president and International Olympic Committee member Sebastian Coe said. “I can see no good reason for it,” he said “There may be vested interests here but the summer sports are protective about the landscape as it’s hard enough for them as it is to grab space in the traditional or digital media. A biennial World Cup will inevitably start clashing with the Olympic Games too."
"And my gut instinct is that you can keep cramming stuff into the calendar if you really want to, but less is more sometimes,” said four-time Olympic medallist Coe.
Giving more countries the chance of playing in a World Cup, and promises of more cash windfall, panders to many of the 211 national federations whose re-election votes the FIFA chief Gianni Infantino requires. For administrators, the prospect of more money is more appealing than possible degradation of a competition and burnout caused to players. “You don’t need to be an Einstein,” Infantino had said, “to know that if you have two World Cups in four years you will double the revenues.” he continued that up by saying: “This will not happen.’’ Let’s see how this debate ends.
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