Spanish officials have dismissed suggestions that co-host Morocco has already secured the right to stage the 2030 World Cup final, insisting the government remains confident the showpiece match will ultimately be held on Spanish soil.
The reassurance follows a British media report claiming that Fifa president Gianni Infantino had privately promised Morocco the final in return for political support. Fifa moved quickly to reject the report, describing it as inaccurate.
Spain, Portugal and Morocco are jointly hosting the 2030 tournament, with the final still four years away and no formal decision yet made on its venue. Morocco is pushing for the match to be staged at its planned King Hassan II Stadium near Casablanca, a venue designed to hold around 115,000 spectators. Spain, meanwhile, can offer two of European football's most storied arenas as alternatives — Real Madrid's Santiago Bernabeu and Barcelona's Camp Nou.
Spanish sports minister Milagros Tolón used an interview with Cadena Ser to make the case for her country hosting the final, pointing to Spain's recent success on the international stage. "We are the reigning men's and women's World Cup champions, and Spain and Portugal spearheaded the bid for the 2030 World Cup, which Morocco later joined. We have many advantages and strengths as a country," she said.
Tolón acknowledged that the initial report had caught Spanish officials off guard, but stressed that Fifa's denial had eased those concerns. "The most important thing is that Fifa has already denied it," she said. "We are working with Fifa, and we have our next meeting in September. They have been very clear and emphatic in denying this news. We will continue working because we want the World Cup final to be in Spain."
A Fifa spokesperson directly addressed the controversy, stating it was "false and misleading to claim the Fifa president has made any promise in relation to hosting the Fifa World Cup 2030 final." The governing body added that any decision on hosting arrangements would be made "in due course," leaving the matter formally unresolved for now.
The dispute over the final's location comes amid a broader period of turbulence for Fifa's leadership. Just days after scrapping a controversial plan to sell off World Cup commercial rights, Infantino found himself apologizing following a crisis meeting held in Rabat, Morocco.
In a statement issued after that meeting, Fifa acknowledged shortcomings in how it had handled the now-abandoned proposal to establish an entity known as Fifa Forward Enterprise. "We acknowledge mistakes were made in the process of the proposed establishment of FIFA Forward Enterprise (FFE)," the statement read. "It was certainly not the intention for the Fifa Council and Fifa Member Associations to feel excluded from the process and it should have been handled differently. We acknowledge that errors were also made after the proposal was leaked to media."
Fifa went on to apologize directly for the missteps, pledging to prevent similar issues in the future. "We sincerely apologise for these errors and commit to them not happening again. With this in mind, we will conduct a necessary review, and a report will be presented to the Fifa Council at its next scheduled meeting."
With Fifa still to determine where the 2030 final will ultimately be played, Spain appears set to continue lobbying hard for the honor in the months ahead, buoyed by its recent championship pedigree and its arsenal of elite stadiums.
Based on reporting from The Independent.