It’s taken time for the Club World Cup to build brand awareness, but opening weekend drew huge crowds in Miami, NYC and Los Angeles.

Al Ahly comes out of Egypt having qualified after winning the CAF Champions League in 2020-21. This is the club’s 10th trip to the CWC, and fourth year in a row. Al Ahly has finished third in three of the last four tournaments.

Thirty-two clubs from around the world will compete in the Club World Cup, which begins Saturday night when Lionel Messi’s Inter Miami hosts Al Ahly, the champions of the Egyptian Premier League. Messi and Miami are +100 favorites on the three-way moneyline for Saturday’s curtain-raiser.

Fans from over 130 countries have purchased nearly 1.5 million tickets for the Club World Cup that kicked off last weekend in its newly expanded format across the United States, FIFA said on Tuesday.

The inaugural 32-team FIFA Club World Cup gets underway on Saturday with soccer legend Lionel Messi and his Inter Miami teammates taking on Africa's most successful club, Al Ahly.

The FIFA Club World Cup is underway as 32 teams from across the globe battle it out in the U.S. in the new-look tournament. Revamped to mimic that of a World Cup, the financially lucrative tournament in its new format features the likes of Real Madrid,

The summer of soccer will take a new look this year with the FIFA Club World Cup, which comes to the U.S. for the first edition of the expanded competition that will see 32 teams from around the world compete for a share of the $1 billion prize purse.

Inter Miami CF and FC Porto face each other this Thursday at the Mercedes-Benz Stadium of the FIFA Club World Cup. The match will be broadcast live at 20:00 on DAZN.In their last fixture, Inter Miami