FIFA approves 48-team World Cup

ZURICH : FIFA has voted to expand the World Cup to 48 teams from its current 32, brushing aside concerns that the expansion would lower the overall standard of the tournament, and make it too big and unwieldy.
Soccer’s governing body said on its Twitter feed that the FIFA Council, its decision-making panel, had voted unanimously in favour of the change which will be introduced at the 2026 tournament.
The new format will include a first round of 16 groups of three teams, FIFA said, with further details to be given later.
FIFA president Gianni Infantino, who replaced the disgraced Sepp Blatter in February, had made World Cup expansion one of his promises during his successful electoral campaign.Infantino had initially suggested a 40-team tournament but then added another eight to that total in October. FIFA’s 211 member associations each hold one vote in the presidential election and 135 of them have never played at a World Cup, so expansion of the tournament was always likely to appeal.