Barcelona and Liverpool out of Club World Cup 2025 for now

With the new 32-team Club World Cup, participants go from earning around one million euros to pocketing 50 million euros for their mere participation. The outlook is looking good for projects lacking financial stability such as Barcelona, who have budgeted to reach at least the quarter-finals of the Champions League and who need to keep progressing in the continental competition in order not to miss out on the new format of the Club World Cup next year.

FIFA has published an online tool to track, live, which clubs win a place in the tournament. Those who have won their continental tournaments in the last three seasons or three years - both concepts are used to equate American and European sport - are already guaranteed a ticket. There are others who, by virtue of their good performances in this period and despite not having sat on the throne of their Confederations, also have access to the competition.

The members confirmed as having won an extra-national trophy since 2021 are Manchester City, Real Madrid, Chelsea - Champions League - Palmeiras, Flamengo, Fluminense - Copa Libertadores - Al Hilal, Urawa Reds - AFC Champions League - Wydad Athletic, Al Ahly - CAF Champions League, Leon, Monterrey and Seattle Sounders - 'Concachampions'. Asia has two representatives instead of three in this regard because Al Ahly won the 2021 and 2023 African Champions League; Asia, because it changed its format and the 2023 award will be awarded on the basis of the 2023-24 campaign.

With these peculiarities, the rest of the participants will be decided through the ranking of each Confederation. Bayern Munich, PSG, Inter Milan, Porto and Benfica -UEFA-, as well as Auckland City -Oceania- have already mathematically secured their presence. There are still places available and they will be decided according to a format of three points for a win, one for a draw and three points for a play-off, which will result in each confederation qualifying.

With Europe, however, the system is different. FIFA understands that, because three complete editions of the Champions League and the group stage of the 23-24 have already been played, it is necessary to adapt to the UEFA coefficient concepts to determine the participants. Thus, exceptionally, there will be two points for a win, one for a draw, four for reaching the group stage, five for reaching the round of 16 and an extra point for progressing from the round of 16 onwards.

What does this mean? That Barcelona, for the moment, are out of the new Club World Cup in favour of Atletico Madrid. Xavi Hernandez's side are 12th in the European table with 56 points, six points behind Diego Simeone's side. Both are alive in the second leg of the Champions League round of 16, so the Catalans need to go through (+2 points) by beating Napoli (+1), for the 'Colchoneros' to lose to Inter (+0) and also reach the semi-finals (+3, one for going through and 2 for winning). Thus, there would be a tie on 62 points and, as the 'Cules' have scored more this year, they would finish ahead.

At the moment, those who would access the revamped Club WC through UEFA, apart from the 'Colchoneros', would be Borussia Dortmund, Juventus and Salzburg. It is curious how these teams are below other better-performing teams, but because they have already covered their countries' quotas - there are two for each - they cannot be in the tournament in the United States. The Austrians, for example, are in 18th place, a long way behind seventh-placed Liverpool, who are out because Manchester City won last season's Champions League and Chelsea won the Champions League in 20-21.