FIFA names 12 stadiums set to stage historic FIFA Club World Cup 2025

FIFA has confirmed the 12 stadiums in the United States that will stage matches at the new FIFA Club World Cup 2025 when the 32 best clubs in the world play for the only official title of FIFA Club World Champions. The tournament kicks off on Sunday, 15 June 2025, with all roads leading to the MetLife Stadium in New York New Jersey on Sunday, 13 July 2025 where the FIFA Club World Cup 2025™ final will be played, just over a year before the venue stages the FIFA World Cup 26™ final. This venue is joined by 11 more – Mercedes-Benz Stadium (Atlanta), Bank of America Stadium (Charlotte), TQL Stadium (Cincinnati), Rose Bowl Stadium (Los Angeles), Hard Rock Stadium (Miami), GEODIS Park (Nashville), Camping World Stadium (Orlando), Inter&Co Stadium (Orlando), Lincoln Financial Field (Philadelphia), Lumen Field (Seattle), and Audi Field (Washington, D.C.). “Football is the most popular sport on the planet, and in 2025 a new era for club football will kick off when FIFA stages the greatest, most inclusive and merit-based global club competition right here in the United States,” said FIFA President Gianni Infantino, who made the announcement at the Global Citizen Festival in Central Park, New York while simultaneously announcing FIFA’s new four-year partnership with Global Citizen to mobilise football fans globally to help end extreme poverty and provide access to education for millions of children. “The FIFA Club World Cup 2025 will feature 12 fantastic stadiums where a new chapter in football’s global history will be written by great players from the 32 best clubs in the world,” Mr Infantino continued. “This new FIFA competition is the only true example in worldwide club football of real solidarity and inclusivity, allowing the best clubs from Africa, Asia, Central and North America and Oceania to play the powerhouses of Europe and South America in an incredible new World Cup which will impact enormously the growth of club football and talent globally. “This is about opportunity and hope for those who need it most, and also about prestige and true football for those who make our sport shine. My thanks go to all. We never discriminate; we include everyone. This is the true spirit of the brand new FIFA Club World Cup. “It has been an honour to make this significant tournament announcement before an enormous, energetic crowd at the Global Citizen Festival here in New York. The fans of the 32 competing clubs will create a similar buzz at the FIFA Club World Cup next year when we take it to the world,” the FIFA President concluded. With the draw set for December, just two of the 32 teams are yet to be confirmed: one from South America, the other representing the host country. Further information regarding the draw, which will see the 32 best clubs in the world divided into eight exciting groups of four, will be released in due course. The tournament match schedule will be published shortly after the draw.

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120 players drilled at FIFA Talent Development Scheme

The Nigeria Football Federation has successfully completed a two-week training program for the National U15 Boys, otherwise known as Future Eagles in Abuja.  This is in line with FIFA’s Talent Development Scheme (TDS) initiative aimed at creating a sustainable legacy for long-term talent development in the country. Head of TDS delegation in Nigeria, Mr. Nasiru Jibril, a former Nigeria international, said the program is a welcome development which will serve as a pathway for every child within the ages of 12-15 to showcase themselves and be discovered.  With the main goal of the TDS project being to help raise the standards of national-team football around the world for both men and women, which is driven by FIFA’s desire for a long-term dedication to global talent development, Jibril said he is confident the program will form the major plank for supplies to our senior national teams in no distant time. “Talent Development Scheme (TDS) is a project initiated by FIFA in all countries of the world to benefit places like Africa. Presently, we are trying to go round and give every single child the opportunity to showcase their talent.  “Players from the ages of 12, 13, and 14 are the ones we are bringing to this center so we can pick the best out of them and build them into a group where the national teams will be getting supplies from. From 2025, the U17 AFCON will become an annual project, and if there is no program like this, any country may struggle in assembling the best legs to represent her.” Also speaking, Head Coach of Nigeria’s U15 national team, Mr Patrick Bassey said the process of recruitment has been transparent with merit as key factor, without any form of bias or sentiments. “In the selection of the players, there has not been any sentiment; every player that was scouted and brought here has the talent, the skill and the commitment to the game. I believe these players will be very useful to the nation in the long run.” A total of 120 players divided into two batches were invited to camp for the first phase of the program, with 40 players to be selected for another schedule before the end of the year, according to Coach Bassey.

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Colombia 2024: Germany thrashes Falconets in Bogota

Two goals in the final half-hour steered three-time champions Germany to a 3-1 victory over Nigeria in their FIFA U20 Women’s World Cup Group D clash at the Estadio Metropolitano de Techo in Bogota on Wednesday night. Nigeria could have gone ahead in the second minute after they snatched the ball from an onslaught by the Germans, but Chiamaka Okwuchukwu failed to beat goalkeeper Rebecca Adamczyk, after shunning the option of passing to team- mates running on goal. After Germany came close in the 10th minute, Rofiat Imuran raced down the left but her cross failed to find Okwuchukwu. Schitler then put the Germans in front in the 17th minute, when she nodded home an inch-perfect cross from the right with goalkeeper Shukura Bakare in no man’s land. There were opportunities at both ends as the game wore on, but Nigeria wasted another great chance to pull level in added time of the first half, when Rofiat Imuran again raced down the left, only to see goalkeeper Adamczyk stop her weak effort with a right-handed smack. Five minutes into the second half, Nigeria were level when Jalla Veit and Adamczyk blundered at the rear to allow Okwuchukwu to race towards an open goal and notch her first strike of the tournament. Germany restored their lead in the 61st minute, with Zoebell poking the ball past Bakare from a teasing cross, in-between two Falconets’ defenders. Okwuchukwu thought she had secured the leveller two minutes later, when she lashed the ball past Adamczyk after cutting in from the right, only to be ruled off-side. The Germans would make it 3-1 in added time, through Ernst’s flying header off a cross from the right that left Bakare rooted to the spot. In the event, the Germans secured their slot in the Round of 16, having earlier defeated Venezuela 5-2 on Matchday 1. Next for the Falconets is a clash with Venezuela in Cali on Saturday evening.

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