Premier League Clubs Refuse Manchester City Request For 2025/26 Season.
Premier League clubs have told reigning champions Manchester City, who are led by Pep Guardiola, to ‘stop moaning’ after the four-in-a-row winners complained about the packed schedule ahead of next year’s FIFA Club World Cup.
Alongside fellow top flight outfit Chelsea, Guardiola’s men will be competing for gold in this summer’s tournament in the United States and, as a result, they requested that the start of the 2025/26 season be delayed to allow them time to prepare.
As expected, Premier League chiefs were quick to decline the club’s request. In response, the club’s chief executive, Ferran Soriano, raised the issue at the shareholders’ meeting in London on Thursday in hopes that he would drum up support.
According to a report from The Times, all 19 other sides – Enzo Maresca’s Chelsea included – were not willing to back up Manchester City’s unusual request, leaving Soriano all but disappointed with the lack of support from his counterparts.
One club higher-up even pointed out that – amid an already-congested schedule, highlighted by Manchester City lynchpin Rodri in the past – there is no obligation for teams to opt in, whereas there is plenty of financial reward.
Taking place, as mentioned, in the United States between June 14 and July 13, the FIFA Club World Cup, which Harry Kane exclusively told GIVEMESPORT Bayern Munich are ‘hungry’ to win, final is a mere 34 days before the 2025/26 Premier League campaign gets underway on August 16.
It’s also just 27 days before the Community Shield but Tony Scholes, the Premier League’s chief football officer, recently explained why a delay in schedule was discussed but not issued the green light on the back of Manchester City’s desperate plea. He said:
We’re having this imposed upon us, particularly by Fifa, so that there’s an element of saying why adjust our competition when we’ve been imposed with a competition we don’t agree with. The calendar is squeezed as much as it can be at the moment and we can’t afford a delay to the start of the season.
Manchester City, the defending world champions having won the title back in 2023, and Chelsea could bank up to £60 million for their participation in the revamped competition after FIFA agreed a broadcast rights deal with DAZN, per The Mirror.
