The reporter reported coldly FIFA has just announced the unprecedented US$1 billion prize fund package for the 2025 Club World Cup, and has released a second "bombshell" to world football: FIFA is considering expanding the 2030 World Cup to 64 teams as a gift for the centenary of the World Cup. This news may seem incredible, but it is not impossible. After all, Infantino has taken four major steps in promoting major reforms in world football: the expansion of the World Cup to 48 teams, the expansion of the Club World Cup to 32 teams, the hosting of the 2030 World Cup by six countries across three continents, and the hosting of the second Winter World Cup in Saudi Arabia, which is widely opposed.

As soon as the news of the World Cup expansion to 64 teams came out, it naturally aroused widespread attention and controversy in world football. After all, if there are 64 teams participating in the finals, accounting for almost 1/3 of all FIFA teams, the resulting concerns about the quality of the competition, the pressure of the event organization and schedule, and the coordination with broadcasters and sponsors have all put a huge question mark on whether this too "crazy" plan can be implemented.

The proposal to expand the 2030 World Cup to 64 teams was suddenly made by Uruguayan representative Ignacio Alonso before the end of the FIFA Council on Wednesday. The New York Times report claimed that the Uruguayans had apparently come prepared, even in English instead of their native Spanish, to read a draft of a proposal that had already been prepared. The FIFA Council was held virtually, and when the Uruguayan delegate proposed the idea of an expansion, the response was a collective silence that was deeply shocked by the rest of the participants.

The British "Times" revealed: Infantino had actually learned of the proposal in advance, and the Uruguayans were obviously "encouraged" before they suddenly attacked. A subsequent statement from FIFA confirmed that the organization had at least no objection to the proposal and said it would begin an analysis of the feasibility of implementing the proposal. The British media even believes that the plan to expand the 64-team team originated from Infantino: after the failure of the previous plan to change the World Cup cycle from four years to two years, the ambitious FIFA president has been hoping to continue to expand the scale of the World Cup.

The Uruguayans have proposed a 64-team expansion, with their own "selfish motives" in the country and South American football. At the beginning, Uruguay and Argentina jointly bid to host the 2030 Centennial World Cup, thinking that the emotional concept of "going home to the World Cup" was bound to win, but they finally lost to the Spanish-Portuguese-Moroccan cross-continental combination personally brokered by Infantino, and the Uruguay-Argentina-Paraguay bid combination of South America only won the symbolic three tournament hosting rights.

If the army is expanded to 64 teams, given that the three countries of Spain and Morocco are responsible for the vast majority of the 48 teams, it is likely that the three South American countries will host all the matches in the new 3-4 groups. The three South American World Cup hosts live up to their name and earn more from hosting them.

Of course, compared with the "small pattern" of Uruguay and South America, Infantino sees a larger pattern: the scale, influence, and commercial benefits of the event are unprecedented in the century-old World Cup, which is not only the trump card for him to seek re-election as FIFA president in 2027, but also because the difficulty of qualifying for the finals is greatly reduced, and there is a high probability that all major economies in the world will participate in the grand event, becoming his "great achievement" beyond his predecessors.

The overwhelming doubts and opposition were the first reaction of the outside world to the proposal to expand the armed forces.

The expansion of the 48-team squad has already raised concerns about the deterioration of the quality of the competition, the difficulty of organizing the tournament and the long schedule. These fears will undoubtedly be amplified now that 16 more teams will be held on three continents, and the number of matches will increase from 104 for 48 teams to 128 for 64 teams, and the schedule is destined to be extended from the 39 days that 48 teams competed. In addition, the battle between clubs and FIFA over the calendar has intensified, and at the same time, the health risks of players are bound to increase.

The media and fans have questioned the main reason for the huge drop in the suspense of the competition due to the expansion of the army, and South America, which has only 10 national teams, may even cancel the qualifiers. From the qualifiers to the group stage of the finals, the vast majority of matches are not spectacular and the suspense of qualifying will further reduce the attractiveness of the World Cup to broadcasters and sponsors.

FIFA's World Cup broadcast contract is still sold for two consecutive editions, and the expansion of the 2030 World Cup means that the broadcast contract negotiations will also change. Many of FIFA's sponsor contracts also expire in 2030, and if the expansion of the army is also facing the problem of renegotiating the sponsorship contract. The expansion means more than 400 new players will participate in the World Cup, with most of the new tournaments likely to fall in the three South American countries where infrastructure, reception capacity and security capacity are inadequate. Coupled with the addition of a large number of fans traveling with the team to and from three continents, the safety risks and environmental pressure of the event organization will also increase significantly.

In short, the 64-team expansion plan involves too many fields such as football, economy and even politics, and it is too unreliable to implement, Infantino's only advantage is time: there are still more than 5 years before the 2030 Centennial World Cup, Infantino first threw out the plan, tested the reaction of all parties, and then slowly coordinated various interest entanglements, and finally decided yes or no.

Of course, in the expansion of the 2030 World Cup, the number of Asian qualifiers will increase to 10-12, which objectively increases the probability of the national football team qualifying.