MIAMI — Lionel Messi and his Inter Miami teammates were back at their training facility on a sweltering Monday morning, beginning preparations for their second Club World Cup game on Thursday in Atlanta against Portuguese team Porto.

Miami finds itself in a better position than many experts predicted, locked in a four-way tie in Group A with ...Read more

LOS ANGELES — Two men showed up at Adrien Frier's Beverly Hills home Thursday afternoon and carried an unusual package onto the backyard patio, where a white-clothed table waited.

Frier, France's consul general in Los Angeles, was preparing to host a party and the 25-pound sterling silver objet d'art was the guest of honor. Standing next to ...Read more

LOS ANGELES — They played a soccer game at SoFi Stadium on Saturday.

Not that many people really cared.

Mexico won, beating the Dominican Republic, 3-2, in the first game of the monthlong CONCACAF Gold Cup. Yet even the team's biggest fans found it hard to celebrate given what was going on just a dozen miles away, where hundreds of people ...Read more

MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. — A sea of red descended on Hard Rock Stadium Saturday night for the highly anticipated Club World Cup opening match, as fans of Egyptian power Al Ahly traveled long distances to see their beloved Red Devils face Lionel Messi and his Inter Miami teammates.

Although the game was being played 21 miles south of Inter Miami’...Read more

PHILADELPHIA — The Club World Cup brings a certain level of excitement for soccer fans. But some are feeling uneasy about the level of security at match venues.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents doubling as security for major sporting events isn’t uncommon. But ahead of the FIFA Club World Cup, which kicked off Saturday in ...Read more

LOS ANGELES — The FIFA Club World Cup, which kicks off Saturday in Miami Gardens, Fla., is the largest, richest and most ambitious club soccer tournament in history. The 32 teams will play 63 games across 12 U.S. venues, competing for a share of a $1 billion prize-money purse.

There will be six first-round games played at the Rose Bowl, ...Read more

PHILADELPHIA — You’ve heard plenty by now about the fact that Philadelphia will host the men’s World Cup next summer, bringing the world’s most famous sporting event here for the first time.

You also might have heard that this summer, the city will host part of the Club World Cup: eight games in 18 days at Lincoln Financial Field, from ...Read more

MIAMI — The first hint that Inter Miami’s Club World Cup opening match Saturday is much bigger than a typical MLS game was the crowd of international media that showed up at the team’s training site Friday morning.

Club co-owner David Beckham was also there, another telltale sign that the game against Egyptian power Al Ahly at Hard Rock ...Read more

RENTON, Wash. — Plenty of tension is swirling around the debut of the FIFA men’s Club World Cup this weekend.

Obed Vargas and his Sounders teammates have tried to not let it tarnish this moment. The teenaged midfielder still feels the same excitement from last December when he watched the tournament’s draft from his phone in his bedroom, ...Read more

LOS ANGELES — The biggest question surrounding the expanded FIFA Club World Cup is why?

Why do we need this tournament? Why is FIFA adding to an international schedule that was already dangerously overcrowded? And why are they doing it less than a year before the 2026 World Cup?

That last question — why now? — is probably the easiest to ...Read more

MIAMI — The casual sports fan may assume that Lionel Messi and his high-profile Inter Miami teammates are locks to advance from a Club World Cup group that includes Al Ahly of Egypt, Porto of Portugal and Palmeiras of Brazil.

But soccer fans who follow the international game are fully aware that although Messi’s No. 10 pink shirt is the ...Read more

SEATTLE — Quick, clear thinking helped Seattle Reign FC forward Jordyn Huitema get to safety during a May home invasion. She said she hid and listened behind a locked door as multiple men ransacked the bedroom she’d exited seconds earlier.

“Just survive,” Huitema said when asked what was going through her mind. “I just hope that they ...Read more

CHICAGO — The NWSL season is long, with games starting in March and rolling through November. The Chicago Stars have found a fun way to release the pressures of the year — and bond.

The soccer players meet up weekly to try their hand at Waddayaknow Trivia, a free event started in 2008 at multiple bars in Illinois to keep family and friends ...Read more

LOS ANGELES — The Department of Homeland Security said border patrol agents will provide security for Saturday's FIFA Club World Cup opener between Inter Miami and Egyptian club Al Ahly at Hard Rock Stadium in Miami Gardens, Fla.

"Let the games begin," U.S. Customs and Border Protection wrote in a social media post Tuesday. "The first FIFA ...Read more

NEW YORK — Meg Kane, the host city executive of Philadelphia’s World Cup organizing committee, joined her counterparts from the other 10 U.S. host cities on Monday for a media event about the tournament’s logistics.

It was the kind of stuff that isn’t always entertaining, but is certainly always important, especially when it comes to ...Read more

CORAL GABLES, Fla. — High above downtown Coral Gables, on the sixth floor of an office building, is the nerve center for the upcoming FIFA Club World Cup, which kicks off Saturday at Hard Rock Stadium with Lionel Messi-led Inter Miami against Egyptian power Al Ahly.

It is there that hundreds of FIFA executives and staff members are working ...Read more

LOS ANGELES — When the CONCACAF Gold Cup was launched, it was intended to be the confederation's version of UEFA's European Championships or CONMEBOL's Copa América.

And for more than a generation it sufficed.

But as Mexico and the U.S. got better, playing group-play matches against the likes of Saint Kitts and Nevis or Martinique every ...Read more

SEATTLE — The MLS Players Association received a formal proposal from the league late Friday regarding how FIFA men’s Club World Cup money would be divided, according to a source with knowledge of the discussions.

The league didn’t deviate from the collective-bargaining agreement to factor the split for the tournament’s participation ...Read more