Los Angeles FC (LAFC) are to host Mexico’s Club America on May 31 in their FIFA Club World Cup qualification playoff, FIFA said on Friday.
The winner would face Chelsea in Atlanta, Georgia, on June 16, Esperance from Tunisia in Nashville, Tennessee, on June 20, and Flamengo of Brazil in Orlando, Florida, on June 25.
The play-in game is needed to complete the 32-team lineup of the tournament that starts on June 14 because another Mexican side, Club Leon, was removed. Leon broke tournament integrity rules by being in the same ownership group as another Club World Cup entry, Pachuca, also from Mexico.
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FIFA announced the date and venue 10 days after Leon’s appeal against expulsion was lost at the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Lausanne, Switzerland.
LAFC’s 22,000-seat home, BMO Stadium — next to the LA Memorial Coliseum and shared with US National Women’s Soccer League club Angel City — would stage the game at 7:30pm.
The Club World Cup entry for LAFC or Club America is worth an initial US$9.55 million from FIFA for a CONCACAF region team, plus a share of the US$1 billion in total prize money based on results at the month-long tournament. It is being played in 11 US cities.
FIFA in March ruled to expel Leon, which qualified by winning the 2023 CONCACAF Champions League.
FIFA said LAFC would be in the playoff because it was the beaten finalist against Leon, while America was the next best-ranked team in its Club World Cup confederation ranking.
It was unclear why America, one of Mexico’s best-supported teams, is eligible when FIFA rules cap each country at two entries unless it has more than two winners of a continental championship in the four-year qualifying period through last year.
Mexico already has Pachuca and Monterrey in the tournament, which has been heavily promoted by FIFA president Gianni Infantino with US President Donald Trump.
Trump has said he would attend the July 13 final at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, to present the gold trophy. It has spent much of the past few weeks in the Oval Office at the White House.
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