The end of Matchday 2 at the FIFA Club World Cup comes on Sunday, June 22 as the night wraps up with Group G action between Al Ain and Manchester City at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta.
This soccer match is scheduled to start at 9 p.m. EDT and will be broadcast on TNT and truTV. Fans looking to watch this match can do so for free by using DIRECTV, which offers a free trial. SlingTV doesn’t offer a free trial but has promotional offers available for streaming the match. DAZN is offering exclusive coverage of every match of the 2025 FIFA Club World Cup and starts at $19.99 a month and also offers a flexible monthly plan.
Manchester City is looking to keep pace with Juventus who has a 5-0 win over Al Ain and a 4-1 victory against Wydad AC to sit atop the group heading into Matchday 3. Manchester City’s lone result so far is a 2-0 victory, which provided a maximum of 3 points, but did little to help the club in the goal differential column.
Matchday 3 for Group G is Thursday, June 26 and will feature Manchester City going against Juventus and Al Ain taking on Wydad AC.
Who: Manchester City vs. Al Ain
When: Sunday, June 22 at 9 p.m. EDT
Where: Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta
Stream: DIRECTV (free trial); SlingTV; DAZN
Betting: Check out our MA sports betting guide, where you can learn basic terminology, definitions and how to read odds for those interested in learning how to bet in Massachusetts.
What is DIRECTV?
DIRECTV is an internet TV service that offers your favorite entertainment, news and sports channels, as well as local TV stations and regional sports networks. Sign up now and get three free months of premium channels including MAX, Paramount+ with SHOWTIME and Starz.
What is Sling TV?
Sling TV offers a variety of live programming ranging from news and sports and starting as low as $20 a month for your first month. Subscribers also get a month of DVR Plus free if they sign up now. Choose from a variety of sports packages without long-term contracts and with easy cancellation.
What is DAZN?
DAZN is a sports streaming service that offers subscribers the chance to get access to plenty of action across boxing, mixed martial arts, other combat sports, women’s sports, soccer and international basketball along with much more. Fans can sign up for a year subscription that starts at $19.99 a month or check out a more flexible monthly plan.
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Club World Cup crowds have wildly fluctuated, from swathes of empty seats to ‘hostile’ atmospheres
By JAMES ROBSON AP Soccer Writer
MIAMI (AP) — As kickoff approached it was clear — the fans weren’t coming. The Club World Cup, soccer’s shiny, new competition, has been billed as the event to breathe new life into the world’s most popular sport.
It began a week ago in the United States, where sports stadiums of monumental capacity and steep tickets prices awaited the rowdy crowds seen at grounds across the world.
But rows and rows of empty seats inside Inter&Co Stadium in Orlando, Florida, on Tuesday told another story.
“It’s like playing football during lockdown,” observed one fan on social media.
For days, world governing body FIFA didn’t register the attendance for the game between Mamelodi Sundowns and Ulsan on its official website. It took until Friday for a figure of 3,412 to be acknowledged on the site, but by rough count, there were less than 1,000 fans in the stands as the game got underway.
At the other end of the spectrum, more than 80,000 watched Champions League winner Paris Saint-Germain vs. Atletico Madrid at the massive Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California.
The opening week for the monthlong tournament across the U.S. has seen some wildly fluctuating attendances.
Orlando attendance is uncomfortably low
The Mamelodi Sundowns-Ulsan game stands out as the low point so far for FIFA and its president, Gianni Infantino, who is banking on the Club World Cup becoming one of the most popular and valuable competitions in sport.
So sparse was the crowd that the word “ORLANDO” — spelled out in yellow seats on one of the main stands at Inter&Co Stadium — was almost completely unobstructed. Crowd control stewards stood by the sidelines and monitored vast areas of empty spaces in the 25,500-capacity venue.
The home of MLS team Orlando City — among the smallest stadiums chosen to host games for the tournament — was still massively oversized for the match, even with ticket prices falling to $23.
A group game between largely unheralded teams from South Africa and South Korea was never likely to be a big seller. And storms, which forced kickoff to be delayed by more than an hour, may have led to no-shows.
Still, it was an uncomfortably low turnout and one of three games in the opening week that drew less than 10,000 fans.
Not even Chelsea, Messi, MLS can pack Atlanta
There were also swathes of empty seats for Chelsea’s game against Los Angeles FC in Atlanta. It was an afternoon kickoff on a weekday, but one of the Premier League’s most popular teams vs. an opponent from MLS couldn’t manage to fill a third of the 71,000-capacity stadium, with 22,000 fans showing up.
“I think the environment was a bit strange. You know, the stadium was almost empty,” Chelsea coach Enzo Maresca said, and even with Lionel Messi in town for the second game in Atlanta — Inter Miami’s win against Porto — the crowd was far from capacity at 31,783.
Club World Cup ticket prices
Uncertainty over ticket sales had been a point of debate in the build up to the tournament, with prices falling dramatically before the opening game between Miami and Al Ahly last Saturday. An impressive crowd of nearly 61,000 watched that game at Hard Rock Stadium in Miami Gardens, Florida, though it is not known how many paid anywhere near the $349 that tickets were being quoted at in December.
As of Tuesday, FIFA said 1.5 million tickets had been sold and more than 340,000 fans had attended the first eight games.
Infantino proudly proclaimed the Club World Cup was growing into “the undisputed pinnacle of global club football.”
Kane calls Hard Rock Stadium a ‘hostile’ scene
Numbers in Miami have been good — nothing lower than 55,000 and topping out at a near-capacity 63,587 for Bayern Munich vs. Boca Juniors. Bayern forward Harry Kane described the atmosphere inside a stadium dominated by Boca fans as “hostile.”
Crowds have still come to Miami in a week when the Florida Panthers were playing in the Stanley Cup Final. Boca and Real Madrid fans queued up for hours in sweltering heat after arriving early for games.
Largest cup crowd was at the Rose Bowl
The biggest crowd of the opening week was 80,619 for PSG vs. Atletico Madrid in LA.
For context, that is just short of the 84,163 who watched the English FA Cup final at Wembley Stadium and well above the 64,327 attendance for the Champions League final — European club soccer’s biggest game.
World Cup, Champions League comparisons
While there was not a sellout game in the opening week, 10 of the first 24 matches have seen crowds in excess of 40,000, for an average of around 36,000.
The average for the Champions League last season was just under 46,000, according to soccer data website Transfermarkt, but like-for-like comparisons are difficult, given this is a totally new format bringing club teams from around the world to the U.S.
At the 2022 men’s World Cup in Qatar there was an average attendance of just under 50,000 per game for the opening week. Of the 20 games played over that period, the highest attendance was 88,103 and all but two of those games had crowds in excess of 40,000.
Looking ahead to the World Cup
Focus on the Club World Cup has been intense for more than one reason.
There is still uncertainty over how much of an appetite there is among fans for another elite soccer tournament and it was unknown how many would be prepared to follow their team to the U.S. According to FIFA, the biggest take up of tickets from abroad was from Brazil, Argentina and Mexico.
Perhaps more significant is what this tournament says about the men’s World Cup, which is largely being staged in the U.S. next year. The Club World Cup could be seen as a gauge of how America’s interest in soccer has grown since last hosting the planet’s biggest sporting event in 1994.
In that sense, it’s not just about statistics, but optics as well. Which is why FIFA will hope to avoid a repeat of the scenes at Mamelodi Sundowns vs. Ulsan.
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AP freelance writers Jackson Castellano in Orlando, Florida, and Allyn Tucker in Atlanta contributed to this report.
The Associated Press contributed to this post
