Fifa seeks advice over banning league games staged overseas amid regulations redraft | Fifa

Fifa has begun overhauling its rules around hosting domestic league matches abroad and is seeking legal advice on whether it can ban them. World football’s governing body wants to ban the practice, but it will rely on legal advice in its first review of relevant regulations in 11 years.

A source involved in the process said Fifa was working to make its rules more robust in preparation for new regulations early next year. This week, UEFA blamed “Fifa’s relevant regulatory framework” for its decision to allow Villarreal v Barcelona to take place in Miami in December and Milan v Como in Perth in February. This would have caused considerable irritation within Fifa because, under current regulations, this decision does not belong to it.

The regulations were drawn up in 2014, when domestic leagues moving their matches to overseas territories were no longer seen as a real problem after the Premier League’s plans for a 39th game failed in 2008. Then-Premier League chief executive Richard Scudamore’s proposal for an “international tour” was ahead of its time, but fans were outraged and the proposal was not pursued elsewhere.

Fifa can only block what its regulations call an “international match” if the correct procedures are not followed. The regulations specify that these matches must be authorized by the football associations of the participating clubs and the territory where a match is to be played as well as the respective confederations.

La Liga and Serie A gave their agreement at the start of the season before transmitting the file to UEFA, which made its decision this week. The problem now falls to the host federations – the US Soccer Federation and Football Australia – and their respective confederations, Concacaf and the Asian Football Confederation.

La Liga has scheduled Villarreal against Barcelona at Inter Miami’s Hard Rock Stadium, but US Soccer’s approval is not guaranteed amid concerns that Major League Soccer could suffer commercially if European and possibly Mexican league matches could also be staged in the country.

FIFA is working to make its regulations clearer despite concerns over its legal situation. US promoter Relevent Sports filed an antitrust lawsuit against US Soccer in 2019 after a request from Barcelona to play Girona in Miami was rejected the previous year, with Fifa named as a co-defendant.

Fifa president Gianni Infantino said this week it would be a “big risk” for football to allow a global scrum. FIFA declined to comment.