UEFA President Aleksander Ceferin criticized FIFA’s proposal to expand the 2030 World Cup to 64 teams, calling it “a bad idea” on Thursday.
The 2026 World Cup, set to be hosted by the United States, Mexico, and Canada, will already increase the tournament’s size from 32 to 48 teams. However, the head of the Uruguayan Football Federation, Ignacio Alonso, suggested further expansion at the FIFA Council meeting in March.
FIFA indicated it had a “duty to analyze” the proposal, but Ceferin strongly rejected it during UEFA’s congress in Belgrade.
“It’s even more surprising to me than to you. I think it’s a bad idea,” Ceferin said. “It’s not good for the World Cup itself, and it’s not good for our qualifiers, either.”
He added, “I don’t support that idea. I don’t know where it came from. It’s strange that we didn’t know anything about this proposal before the FIFA Council meeting.”
The 2030 World Cup will be held across three continents, with Portugal, Spain, and Morocco as the primary hosts. To mark the centenary edition, three matches will also be played in South America, in Argentina, Uruguay, and Paraguay, where the first World Cup was held in 1930.
This decision also paved the way for Saudi Arabia to host the 2034 World Cup.
