Perk of a dictatorship is that they can just bribe the right people to either overlook the ownership issues or, just temporarily shift 26% ownership to the minority "non-profits" involved in the clubs and voila, no conflict!
They just announced that there are 70,248 in attendance for the Real Madrid -Pachuca match at Bank of America Stadium in Charlotte. The stadium has a capacity of 74,867 so there weren't too many empty seats.
Having two teams owned by the Emirate of Abu Dhabi isn't an issue (Man City and Al Ain). And they are about to play each other...
FIFA is just like America now…the elite are wholly beyond the reach of law. De facto, not de jure, but de facto is all that matters.
Man City are owned by Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan while the President of Al Ain is Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan. But he's definitely not the owner of the latter, no siree Bob! How could anyone po$$ibly come to that conclu$ion?
They are in two different leagues and confederations though. León was removed from the competition due to violating the FIFA Appeal Committee's rules on multi-club ownership in the same league. León and Pachuca had the same owner in Liga MX and that is why FIFA confirmed their exclusion.
Breakthrough result for European football as Salzburg held Al Hilal to a scoreless draw. Weather in DC not quite as unpleasant as forecast. Lots of Al Hilal supporters there.
The difference in league/confederation is not relevant as per the applicable regulations (nor should it be if the idea is to prevent a conflict of interest). But CFG and Al Ain have enough “on paper” differences/distractions to tick that box. Ultimately Grupo Pachuca didn’t have enough time to move things around on a group org chart. Maybe we can have a “pure” CFG scenario next time. With Man City and either NY or Melbourne City. Or all three! In related news, Crystal Palace are about to resolve their ownership issue: https://www.insideworldfootball.com...on-jetting-textors-190m-crystal-palace-stake/
I'm sure Grupo Pachuca will have or already have things sorted out in case both of its qualify again. This lost them $9.5M.
Apparently the idea is for Leon to be sold by 2027: https://mimorelia.com/amp/story/not...l-club-león-confirma-que-será-vendido-en-2027
Here is the headline bbc went with for the CWC https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/articles/c74z8v15g8eo
Manchester City against Al Ain is the most friendly match feeling game so far. 0 atmosphere, 0 effort, half pace...