There's a vocal negative outcry, particularly coming out of Europe. I'll get to those reasons shortly. There's a less than vocal just nonchalance in teh US, the host country. There's a vocal loud love, so far, of this from South America, and Africa. On the whole, it's way too early to call success or failure, but let's get to some of the pro's and con's so far a few days in, and since i'm very much in the "pro" camp, this will be more me pushing back against the Con's and extolling the virtues of the Pro's.
Con's
5.) This is a fake tournament / cash grab
I mean, the fact that this is a cash grab is 100% true. But FIFA is a business. We've gone so far away from FIFA, or organized football, being anything but a cash-hungry, greedy business. The Club World Cup isn't even nearly as bad as say the rube goldberg-type logic to get the 2034 World Cup in Saudi Arabia. Or say LaLiga selling its Supercopa to, yet again, Saudi Arabia. Also, the fake tournament stuff is jsut stupid. All tournaments are fake, in that sense. Games are only as important as we give them importance. Of course right now there is no cache behind this tournament yet - but way back in 1934, people literally did say the same thing about the World Cup, which took over from The Olympics as the world's premier football tournament. That started out as a fake tournament / cash grab as well.
4.) These are glorified friendlies
This is tied a bit with the earlier one, but the logic is just dumb. Yes, the Atletico v PSG match seemed to be played at 80% pace, but that may have also had to do with the 100-degree day in Los Angeles. Most matches are clearly being played at a level above friendles - especially all of them involving South America and Africa so far. If the European teams are treating these like their old pre-season international tour friendlies, then that is their loss. And hopefully there are losses eventually for the UEFA teams. Friendlies have no meaning. These have meaning. The winning team will celebrate this. Let's take heed from the Nations League, which similarly replaced friendlies, and have turned into something pretty cool.
3.) The gap is too much - i.e. it will end up being all European teams
Again, if we think these are friendlies, or at least not being taken seriously by European teams, then this will eventually not be true. But right now, the point of this tournament is to show the gap. Yeah, Bayern hammering a semi-pro New Zealand team 10-0 was a bit much, but that was one of the more one-sided matchups. We've also seen Brazilian teams beat Portugeuse ones. We've seen African teams play well. There will invariably be upsets in the knockouts, but ultimately yeah it is likely most of the semifinalists and likely finalists and liekly winner all come from Europe. At the end of the day, those domestic leagues are just that much better for now.
2.) No one is showing up
On one hand, this has been true in some matches. Particularly the emptiness in Atlanta for the LA Galaxy v Chelsea game. Now, that game was played in Atlanta at 2pm local time. And probably featured the two areas of the world that seem the least into thsi so far: Europe and North America. But we should critique FIFA here - mostly because they set frankly ridiculous prices for these games. They've had to slash them to sell tickets - but ultimately, I'm fine with that tradeoff - FIFA gets less money than their greed wanted, and we get solid atmosphere's at most games. And if Europe continues to not care, then so be it. A lot of the con's coming out of Europe around this wreak of European football exceptionalism.
1.) The football calendar is now even more full
More than any other con, this is the only one that really resonates. The football calendar is just stupid full right now, and it's really tied to the various levels of football not working together. FIFA had their World Cup (which of course they continue to expand). UEFA wanted something similar so made the Euros. Great. We've lived with that every other year thing for a while. But then UEFA had the Champions League. FIFA wanted in on the club action. UEFA also wanted even more, so made the Nations League. Every domestic league seemingly has 1-2 cup competitions. Brazil league plays like 70 games. Think about PSG. They finished the French season in mid-May. Then had to play Champions League final end of May. Then some of their players had the Nations League final the weekend after. And now they are back in this. By the time this tournament ends, it will be like only a few weeks until the league starts up again. There is no time off. There will be more injuries and shorter careers and what not. But still, this is not the fault of the Club World Cup.
Pro's
5.) The crowds are actually way better than been advertised
This whole lack of crowd thing is so stupid. Basically any game that features at least one non-European or American team has filled >80% of the stadium. Yes, FIFA had to cut prices, but again - fuck FIFA and all, but why should we care. And lastly, because I'm sure not fully sold out stadiums will be a thing next year too - let's just remember that the US will host games exclusively in NFL stadiums that seat 65,000 - 80,000 people. These are larger than most stadiums in prior World Cup host countries, which often mixed 2-3 stadiums of that size with more in the 40,000 - 50,000 rate. Lot easier to fill that. Anyway, PSG and Atletico filled most of the Rose Bowl. Boa and Benfica filled Miami. This is drawing well, just not from the elitist UEFA contingent.
4.) The passion from the non-European countries has been great
There have been great videos of Palmeiras fans milling about cities, same with Flamenco, Tunis, Boca, Benfica, others. Sure, maybe Londoners haven't made the trip. Let's see about Real Madrid later (though at least with them they have a giant US-based fanbase). The energy has absolutely been there. These matches mean so much to fans of clubs outside of UEFA, who don't get the spotlight. The idea of a South American team playing a top European team and potentially winning is something to rally around. The idea that tehre wasn't interest in this tournament is a pure fallacy. If anything, I'm shocked how quickly it's picked up steam.
3.) Seeing South American clubs play European ones are just fun
Again, these matchups are just fun, especially in a larger format than the earlier Club World Cup which featured effectively just one club per region. This is a lot more special. This is, in that way, just like the World Cup. It's just cool seeing matchups of two clubs in a meaningful setting in a way that never would have happened previously. The legacy of a whole continent is very much on the line here.
2.) All FIFA tournaments start as cash grabs
Again, I can't reiterate this point enough, that somehow this tournament is the one that people feel is the tipping point is absurd. Also, the soccer world's whole MO is largesse, and always there's initially some push back, before people often realize things just work better. I already mentioend the example of the World Cup initially getting some complaints and pushback. That sounds absurd now, but was absolutely true at the time. Even the Champions League, which became an insane success, was initially seen as a sign of UEFA's greed by opening up the prior Cup Winners Cup (and then European Cup). More teams, diluting play, what-not. Well, dilution is not always a bad thing...
1.) This does help the game get more global
At the end of the day, football is becoming an increasingly global game. Maybe not in distribution of talent, but in distribution of dollars and interest. And let's take heed from the World Cup. In 1998, they expanded the World Cup to 32 teams - and people felt it was going to turn into a series of blowouts for those new eight teams. And that happened for a bit - say Germany's 8-0 win over Saudi Arabia in 2002. But surely but slowly, the "lesser" teams got better, culminating in 2018 when all teams scored at least one goal for the first time, and then in 2022, when no team won all its group games, and we saw the likes of Saudi Arabia, that same team that lost 8-0 to Germany twenty years earlier, beat eventual Champions Argentina. The world is smaller. Club football isn't, yet, but while it will probably take some act of God for any federation outside Europe to become the pre-eminent one, the idea that this will end up with eight UEFA quarterfinalists is just silly. And over iterations, I can see the world get smaller here too, and it is very much worth seeing that play out.