Gianni Infantino denies expanding the World Cup will dilute the quality – “Italy and England were knocked out by Costa Rica…”
The FIFA President has proposed expanding the tournament to 48 teams, with a “play-in” to determine the 32 in the group stages.
“The World Cup is not just a sporting event,” Infantino explained to Le Parisien.
Gianni Infantino denies expanding the World Cup will dilute the quality – “Italy and England were knocked out by Costa Rica…”
The FIFA President has proposed expanding the tournament to 48 teams, with a “play-in” to determine the 32 in the group stages.
“The World Cup is not just a sporting event,” Infantino explained to Le Parisien.
“It’s something huge on a social level. FIFA’s main task should be developing football, and there’s nothing stronger than qualification for a World Cup, it packs a country for six months.
“So if we increase the number of participants, we can develop football in more countries. I’m told the quality will suffer, but I remember that in 2014 Italy and England were knocked out by Costa Rica.
“The 16 best are already guaranteed to play in the group stages. There are then 32 others. These 32 would compete with each other at the beginning of the World Cup, in the host country.
“Then the 16 winners would join the 16 already qualified. The difference is that if these games were played in November then the eliminated teams would be in crisis.
“This way, there will be euphoria until June. With the new principle, Ukraine and France would have played each other in Brazil in June.
“It would be for the World Cup in 2026. For 2018 and 2022 it won’t change.”
Infantino was then asked about the controversial 2022 World Cup in Qatar, and denied it could be cancelled.
“I’ve always been clear, a decision was taken in 2010. We’re in 2016. Since 2010, we’ve criticised Qatar and we’ve criticised Russia.
“What interests me is organising the best World Cup in history, in 2018 in Russia and then in 2022 in Qatar. I see this as a chance for those countries.
“This is a complicated era in international relations, and these events will make it possible to discover new regions of the world in a different spirit.”
After trials of Video Assistant Referees, the FIFA chief was asked about its potential use in the World Cup.
“I was quite skeptical, because I was worried the video would impact the fluidity of the game,” Infantino admitted.
“I realised during the tests though that this isn’t the case. We’ll do more of these for two years and then in March 2018 we’ll decide.
“I hope we’ll have video refereeing for the 2018 World Cup.”