The idea of a 64-team World Cup is back on the agenda after some of South America’s most powerful football executives met with FIFA on Tuesday to present their proposals for an expanded tournament in 2030.
The 2026 World Cup, scheduled for next summer, will be the largest ever with 48 teams, but that’s still not enough for the South American Football Confederation (CONMEBOL), which is determined to celebrate the tournament’s centenary by hosting as many matches as possible on its continent four years later.
The first World Cup was held in 1930 in Uruguay, and the 2030 tournament will be held in Spain, Portugal, and Morocco, with the opening three matches in Uruguay, Argentina, and Paraguay.
The South American Confederation (CONMEBOL) wants more matches and more teams, and defended this approach during a meeting between its president, Alejandro Dominguez, and his FIFA counterpart, Gianni Infantino, in New York on Tuesday.
The idea of a 64-team World Cup is back on the agenda after some of South America’s most powerful football executives met with FIFA on Tuesday to present their proposals for an expanded tournament in 2030.
The 2026 World Cup, scheduled for next summer, will be the largest ever with 48 teams, but that’s still not enough for CONMEBOL, which is determined to celebrate the tournament’s centenary by hosting as many matches as possible on its continent four years later.
The first World Cup was held in 1930 in Uruguay, and the 2030 tournament will be held in Spain, Portugal, and Morocco, with the opening three matches in Uruguay, Argentina, and Paraguay.
The South American Football Confederation (CONMEBOL) wants more matches and more teams, and defended this approach during a meeting between its president, Alejandro Dominguez, and his FIFA counterpart, Gianni Infantino, in New York on Tuesday.
FIFA has a duty to study the proposals and ideas put forward by its member associations, and a 64-team tournament is not a priority for the current FIFA administration.
A 64-team World Cup would see nearly a third of FIFA’s 211 member associations participate in the finals, making qualification a mere formality for the strongest teams.
Uruguayan Football Association president Ignacio Alonso first raised this proposal at the FIFA Council meeting in March.
In May, the president of its confederation, Dominguez, said that “no team should be excluded” from the 2030 World Cup.
The first World Cup was played with 24 teams in Spain in 1982, and the tournament was expanded to 32 teams in France in 1998.
