Club World Cup is proof of concept that bigger, global tournament can work

It’s OK, you can admit it. It’s just us, don’t be embarrassed. If you’re a casual fan, you probably knew close to nothing of most of the non-European teams in the Club World Cup unless they were from your region, with the exception of Inter Miami (because, well, Lionel Messi).

LAFC: Isn’t that the team David Beckham played for? (No, that’s the other team from Los Angeles, the Galaxy … the one with the two World Cup winners.)

Urawa Red Diamonds: That’s from Super Mario, right? (No, they’re from Japan and draw almost as many fans per game as Chelsea or Juventus.)

Ulsan HD: Isn’t that a brand of TV? (Maybe, but this Ulsan won the past two South Korean league titles.)

You may have heard of Brazil’s Flamengo, but might have equally been surprised there’s no long-legged pink bird on their crest. (The name comes from the Portuguese word for Flemish and stems from a Rio de Janeiro neighborhood.)

And admit it — we’re among friends — you probably thought all three teams with the word “Al” in the name (Al Ain, Al Ahly and Al Hilal) were from Saudi Arabia, since we in the mainstream media keep talking about how the country is spending billions to attract the world’s top players from Cristiano Ronaldo on down. (Actually, Al Hilal is the only Saudi club of the three, as Al Ain are from the United Arab Emirates and — this may confuse you — the Saudi Pro League also has an Al Ahly. It’s just that this Al Ahly is from Egypt.)

If you’re a soccer nerd — or someone who gets paid to do this, like me — you know that many of these clubs are massive local institutions, and some were historically among the best in the world. But the Club World Cup isn’t designed to attract soccer devotees, who will tune in anyway — it’s meant to reel in the casuals and one day grow into a legitimate little brother of that sporting, cultural and entertainment juggernaut we know as the men’s World Cup. That’s not easy to do when more than half the teams in it have the global name recognition of the guy who played Darth Vader in the original Star Wars trilogy.

That’s why it was so important to FIFA that the Club World Cup group phase not degenerate into a series of WWE-style squash-fests in which the European clubs cruised through to a quarterfinal set that looks like the UEFA Champions League, only played over a single set and on a different continent.

While we could still get seven of eight UEFA quarterfinalists, by and large FIFA got its wish. The group stage was generally competitive. My colleague Ryan O’Hanlon took a deep dive into the relative strengths of the teams and the leagues and concluded that, maybe, the gap between Europe’s elite and everyone else isn’t as big as some thought.

With the exception of New Zealand semi-pros Auckland City (who nevertheless also grabbed a 1-1 draw against Argentinian giants Boca Juniors), nobody looked woefully out of place — no more than Southampton looked out of place in the Premier League last year anyway. Take Auckland out of the mix, and if you define blowout as a game decided by more than three goals, well, there were just four matches out of 45 that qualify as blowouts, and one of them was the all-European affair between Paris Saint-Germain and Atletico Madrid.

FIFA crowed about it in a news release Friday, noting that the 16 sides in the knockouts come from 10 different countries and that four of the six Confederations are represented in the Round of 16. (It could have been five out of six: Africa’s Mamelodi Sundowns came darn close, finishing on four points.) As for those European juggernauts, three of the twelve (Atletico Madrid, Porto and — ahem — FC Salzburg) exited in the group stage. All but one of them (Manchester City) dropped points against non-European competition.

In terms of the football itself? Well, this is proof of concept. Contrary to what some insist — and the impression we in the mainstream media might give — the rest of the world can in fact hang with Europe.

Yeah, I’ve heard the argument that some UEFA teams weren’t taking it seriously. I’m not sure that was the norm at all. The only ones to rotate their teams significantly were City, Chelsea and Bayern, and all three advanced. I heard other arguments, too, about how it was unfair to the European teams that they had to play in hot conditions and how, for them, this tournament comes at the end of the season while for others it’s in mid-season, so the players are fitter and less tired.

The heat factor is kind of nonsense. Sure, it’s not fun playing in extreme conditions and the spectacle suffers, but is it really some weird, upset-causing leveler? Every single edition of the Euros is played in the summer, as are most World Cups. We still see the best teams advancing. None of these clubs are accustomed to playing in extreme heat: those from hotter nations tend to play their games at night if they do play in the summer (and most don’t).

As for the midseason/end-of-season factor? Sure, maybe it helped the South American sides a bit. But the seasons in Africa and Asia run on a fall-to-spring calendar, just like most of Europe. And most of these teams had a three-week break between the end of their club seasons and the start of the Club World Cup.

I’m a strong believer that the Club World Cup, as a tournament, is a good thing. Europe may have 99% of the world’s soccer resources, but step on to the pitch and the gap is nowhere near that big. The soccer world is a smaller place than we previously thought.