Football

FIFA Club World Cup to kickoff on December 11

The match timings and venues will be announced in due course; final will be played on December 21.

Team Sportstar Team Sportstar
26 July, 2019 13:53 IST

Real Madrid is the current holder of the FIFA Club World Cup.   -  Getty Images

Team Sportstar Team Sportstar
26 July, 2019 13:53 IST

The 2019 FIFA Club World Cup is set to begin on December 11, Bureau of the FIFA Council has announced on Friday.

Among the eight participating teams, three have already been confirmed: Mexico's CF Monterrey (winner of the 2019 CONCACAF Champions League), New Caledonia's Hienghène Sport (winner of the 2019 OFC Champions League) and England's Liverpool FC (winner of the 2018-2019 UEFA Champions League).

The participants from CAF, AFC and CONMEBOL will be known in the coming months.

The club representing host Qatar will depend on the outcome of the ongoing AFC Champions League. If a team from the host country is the AFC champion, it will qualify directly for the second round, with the AFC runner-up playing the opening match against Hienghene Sport. If not, Al Sadd SC, the Qatar Stars League title holder, will play Hienghene Sport.

RELATED | FIFA Club World Cup to replace Confederations Cup in 2021

The winner of the first-round match and the representatives of the AFC, CAF and Concacaf, drawn in no particular order as teams A, B, C and D, will contest the second round.

The draw for the tournament to determine the pairings for the second-round matches and the semifinals will be done in Zurich on September 16.

The second‑round winners will face the UEFA or CONMEBOL representatives in the semifinals, with the respective pairings having been previously defined by the draw.

The kick-off timings and venues will be announced in due course. The final will be played on December 21.

Full schedule

First round

Match 1: Al Sadd SC vs Hienghene Sport - 11 December

Second round

Match 2: Monterrey vs Winner of match 1 - 14 December

Match 3: Al-Hilal vs Esperance de Tunis - 14 December

Play-off for 5th place and semifinal matches

Match 4: Play-off for 5th place - 17 December

Match 5: Flamengo or winner of match 3 - 17 December

Match 6: Winner of match 2 vs Liverpool FC - 18 December

Play-off for 3rd place and final match

Match 7: Play-off for 3rd place - 21 December

Match 8: Final - Winner of match 5 and 6 - 21 December

 

Support Sportstar

Dear Reader,

Support our journalism — where text and pictures intermingle so seamlessly — and help us scale up your experience as the world changes around us. Your contribution is vital to our brand of uninfluenced, boots-on-the-ground reportage that’s worth your while. Clickbait sensationalism is not for us, but editorial independence is — we owe it to you.

  Dugout videos