FIFA president says expansion of World Cup 2022 possible

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FIFA president Gianni Infantino said in an interview on Monday that possibility of expanding to 48 teams at the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar will not be ruled out, reported Spain's sports newspaper Marca.

"For the moment, we have a World Cup with 32 teams which will be played in Qatar, that is the current situation. CONMEBOL (South American Football Confederation) made an interesting request, so we will have to look into it. More teams means more stadiums, more venues, more hotels, more transportation," said Infantino.

A mock-up of Ahmed bin Ali Stadium, a venue for 2022 FIFA World Cup football matches, seen at the Headquarters of the Qatar 2022 Local Organising Committee (LOC). /VCG Photo

The "interesting request" is the proposal to expand participating teams from 32 to 48 in Qatar in 2022. FIFA announced in January 2017 that there will be 48 teams playing at the World Cup from 2026. However, Yahoo Sports in April reported that the expansion may be shifted to an earlier date in 2022.

Infantino made it clear that two major difficulties are there before the expansion could become reality. One of the challenges would be to increase the number of stadiums, hotels, training campuses as well as to provide additional resources for traffic management.

The construction site of Lusail Iconic Stadium, a venue for 2022 FIFA World Cup football matches. Qatar is to host the FIFA World Cup in late 2022. /VCG Photo

The other hurdle is to manage a majority vote for the proposal to be passed. Infantino said the expansion is something that "should be looked into" but agreed it's still "premature".

Previously there were reports about a FIFA insider source suggesting that Qatar could cooperate with its neighboring countries to host the 2022 World Cup if expansion to 48 teams places too much pressure. When asked about this, Infantino said he did not know about it but " everything is open".