The atmosphere of the Club World Cup: When football loses the stands, how can the championship retain love?

Thanks to the two worlds of ice and fire brought by the third match day of the Club World Cup. The strangled confrontation between Boca youth and Benfica, the red waves caused by Flamengo fans to defeat Tunisia Hope, these moments pierced the groggy tone of the championship like a heart-wrenching needle. When the South American team's fanatical shouts are intertwined with the tactical game of European powerhouses, the original charm of football is interpreted through the resonance between the stands and the lawn - the tension that makes every fight affect the nerves and makes the referee's whistle look particularly clear is the soul that top-level events should have.

However, Chelsea's 2-0 victory over Los Angeles FC wrote a negative footnote at the Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta. The problem is far more than the empty outline outline outlines outlined by tens of thousands of empty seats, but also the sense of alienation in the venue - the audience seemed to passers-by who accidentally entered the set, and even the applause was awkward as if passing by by chance. The 2,000-mile geographical gap between Los Angeles and Atlanta has naturally lacked local support for this Monday afternoon event; and the cost of watching the game across the Atlantic for Chelsea fans, coupled with the controversial positioning of the Club World Cup itself, has made the shouts of Stamford Bridge become a faint echo here. Although the showdown between Paris Saint-Germain and Atletico Madrid attracted more spectators due to Sunday schedule, it was also trapped in a deadly atmosphere cage. The cheers were as thin as unlit fireworks, and the tension that made the skin hot in the Champions League are completely gone.

This atmosphere vacuum forms an insurmountable cognitive impairment in the Club World Cup. There is no doubt that opponents of the Club World Cup have never lacked arguments, but even the audience who sincerely expects its success will inevitably be confused by the contrast between sporadic applause and the empty stands: Why do we cheer when we watch this event? Comparing it to preseason may be cliché, but the kind of adult rationality that “I could have done something more important” does indeed echo in the empty stadium.

There is an essential question here: Where does the soul of the football championship come from? FIFA cannot give the event a sense of heavy history through administrative orders. No matter how many "elite" labels are used to package them or throw out sky-high bonuses, it cannot replace the reputation accumulated by time. Internet celebrity marketing also has fatal shortcomings - they can bring traffic exposure, but they cannot make the audience resonate with events that lack emotional connection. When the internet celebrity audience is uninterested in the content of the event, traffic becomes a fleeting digital bubble. The dilemma of the Club World Cup lies in: it shows the technical shell of football, but it loses the emotional core that empathizes the audience.

The real charm of sports never ends with the techniques and tactics themselves. Looking back on the classic battles that are remembered, whether it is the tsunami of the Istanbul miracle or the tears of Maracana, the core attraction is always the collective perception of "importance" - this perception does not come from the value of the trophy or the star lineup, but the sense of urgency that surges in the stands. When flamenco fans weave the red sky with fireworks, even neutral audiences can feel that it is a "moment of history that cannot be missed", and this atmosphere is exactly the most scarce element of the current Club World Cup. The high ticket prices, the cost of cross-border viewing, and the radical expansion of the scale of the event have jointly disintegrated this sense of on-site ceremony.

The 2023 Club World Cup is still within the framework of the seven teams in a single city, but it suddenly expanded to 11 cities and 32 teams two years later. This expansion logic of "a restaurant suddenly opens 20 branches" is destined to lead to the blurred positioning of the event. Perhaps a more reasonable path is to first create 10-team high-quality events in two or three cities, cultivate a sense of community through concentrated competitions, and let every confrontation be deposited into legendary anecdotes in the mouths of fans - just like the World Cup and European Cup, use on-site memories to build reputation, and then gradually expand the army according to real needs. The extensive thinking of "when they are built, they will come" completely ignores the deep connection between football and fan culture. The fundamental fallacy of the Club World Cup is to strip football into a mechanical combination of "ball and player". When Boca and Benfica's players were fighting cramps on the turf, and when Flamenco fans trembled the stadium with their singing, people suddenly realized that the nature of football has always been the carrier of emotional resonance. The loyalty and tribalism that defines the culture of fans, the stands that make players run more meaningful, are the foundation of the sport. The Club World Cup, which lacks a clear emotional anchor, is now trapped in the cycle of "empty performance" - even if the skills on the field are superb, it cannot escape the embarrassing positioning of "soulless football show".