PSG vs Atletico Madrid live updates: Club World Cup 2025 team news, latest score for heavyweight clash – The New York Times

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It is day two at the 2025 Club World Cup with Paris Saint-Germain vs Atletico Madrid opening Group B at the Rose Bowl.
This all-European affair should be a cracker, as recently crowned European champions PSG take on one of Spain’s most consistent clubs — and both sides will harbour hopes of going all the way at this tournament.
PSG XI: Donnarumma; Hakimi, Marquinhos, Mendes, Pacho; Ruiz, Vitinha, Neves; Kvaratskhelia, Ramos, Doue
Atletico Madrid XI: Oblak; Llorente, Lenglet, Javi Galan, Le Normand; De Paul, Barrios, Lino; Griezmann, Alvarez, Giuliano
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Atletico Madrid and Paris Saint-Germain have met only once in a competitive fixture prior to today's match. It came this past season, during the league phase of the Champions League in November.
Warren Zaire-Emery gave the French side an early lead at the Parc des Princes but his goal was quickly cancelled out by Nahuel Molina. The score remained deadlocked at 1-1 until the third minute of second-half stoppage time, when Angel Correa finished off a great counter-attack to steal all three points for the Spanish side.
Atletico remarkably had only 29 per cent of possession during the match, their lowest in a UCL victory on the road in this century.
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PSG coach Luis Enrique has also put out his strongest possible side. The one change from their winning Champions League final XI is Ousmane Dembele out after picking up an injury with France in the recent Nations League, replaced by Goncalo Ramos fresh from winning the Nations League final with Portugal.
Hello from a very hot, sticky Rose Bowl. I'm sitting pretty in an air-conditioned press box but the midday sun is going to be absolutely roasting those outside. There is not a bit of shade to be found in this lovely old ice cream scoop of a stadium. Will that affect the spectacle on the pitch? PSG might find it hard to sustain their usual intensity in these conditions.
Paris Saint-Germain’s Champions League victory in Munich last month was too recent to count towards their Club World Cup qualification — but it still makes them one of the serious contenders for glory here.
PGS’s stunning 5-0 rout of Inter sits alongside their Ligue 1 championship and Coupe de France success this season, and right now they should be considered the best team in Europe.
That said, it takes a lot to discount Real Madrid from any tournament in which they’re competing.
Manchester City are the reigning champions here after 2023 success in Saudi Arabia, while most of UEFA’s representatives will be expected to progress from the group stage.
As for elsewhere, Flamengo lead Brazil’s Serie A after 11 games and could be a threat and Mamelodi Sundowns (South Africa) reached the final of the CAF Champions League this campaign.
The Rose Bowl sits nearly 92,000 people, fairly standard for an American football stadium of its stature. But when the UCLA Bruins play home games here in the fall, they close off several upper seating sections of the stadium and cover those with logoed tarps, knowing they won’t draw nearly that many people. That, of course, forces fans to sit more clustered together in the remaining sections.
Given all the intrigue over how many attendees actually show up to these matches, all I’m saying is that if FIFA wants to take a similar approach to give the impression of a fuller venue, there’s plenty of precedent.
Unlike some of the other Club World Cup host venues such as MetLife Stadium in New Jersey and Hard Rock Stadium in Miami, the storied, century-old Rose Bowl will not be host venue for 2026 World Cup games in the Los Angeles area next summer. That honor belongs to SoFi Stadium, just over 20 miles/32 kilometers to the southwest in Inglewood, Calif.
SoFi Stadium, a modern marvel which opened in 2020, is home to both of L.A.’s NFL teams but had to be slightly remodeled recently to fit a wider field for soccer play that aligned with FIFA regulations. Despite that, it’s hosted several high-profile CONCACAF matches in recent years, including Mexico’s 2025 Gold Cup opener yesterday. The stadium is owned by Arsenal co-chairman Stan Kroenke, who also owns the NFL’s Los Angeles Rams.
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Atletico are staying at the Hotel Conrad in downtown LA. It’s on West First Street, just 500 metres from City Hall, where a lot of the protests have been taking place.
So it’s inside the curfew zone – and police sirens and helicopter noise has been constant. Yesterday’s press conference was rescheduled at short notice away from the stadium to their training facility at the Memorial Coliseum, and rescheduled from 6:30 in the evening to 10:30 in the morning.
“We just have to adapt to the situation, which does not depend on us, but what is happening in the country,” Simeone said there. “Our routine has not been altered. We just focus on what we can manage ourselves.”
Atletico are based at the Conrad through the whole group phase – except for flying up to Seattle for two days for Wednesday’s second game against the Sounders.
As someone who grew up in Pasadena, Calif. near the Rose Bowl, I’m curious to hear about the experience fans have getting to the stadium. The iconic venue sits in a miniature valley forged by the watershed from the old Arroyo Seco (“dry river” in Spanish). The valley itself is completely surrounded by residential areas. That makes getting in and out of the area by car notoriously difficult, even by U.S. standards, for marquee events at the Rose Bowl. Even driving to and from relatively smaller events, such as when the UCLA Bruins play their American college football home games here in the fall, can be a challenge.
PSG XI: Donnarumma; Hakimi, Marquinhos, Mendes, Pacho; Ruiz, Vitinha, Neves; Kvaratskhelia, Ramos, Doue
Subs: Safonov, Tenas, Beraldo, Hernandez, Kamara, Lee, Mayulu, Zaire-Emery, Mbaye
Atletico coach Diego Simeone has picked a pretty much first choice XI for their first ever Club World Cup game.
Simeone’s biggest call came up front, where he’s picked veteran Antoine Griezmann (no goals in his last 16 games) over Alexander Sorloth (11 goals in his last 13 La Liga outings of 2024-25). Simeone really trusts Griezmann though, and he’s got the nod for this high profile game.
The other big decision was at centre-back, where Clement Lenglet (who just joined Atletico on a permanent deal after being on loan from Barcelona last season) is chosen over Jose Maria Gimenez (who arrived at the camp more recently having been on international duty with Uruguay).
Here is how these clubs got here. Please direct all comments and complaints to FIFA — or even better: live@theathletic.com
*All rankings cover a four-year period from 2021 to 2024
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Atletico Madrid XI: Oblak, Llorente, Lenglet, Javi Galan, Le Normand, De Paul, Barrios, Lino, Griezmann, Alvarez, Giuliano
Subs: Musso, Gomis, Gimenez, Azpilicueta, Molina, Witsel, Reinildo, Kostis, Gallagher, Koke, Lemar, Riquelme, Sorloth, Correa, Martin
The short answer to that is: no.
FIFA imposed a two-club limit on teams from a single country — unless there were more than two different winners of their continent’s leading tournament.
That is why there are four teams from Brazil, while Barcelona and Liverpool have made way for the likes of Austria’s Red Bull Salzburg.
The Club World Cup used to be a simple affair, where the winner of each confederation’s primary competition — for example UEFA’s Champions League — qualified alongside a seventh entrant from the domestic champions of the tournament’s host country.
Upping the format to 32 teams and altering the cadence from one to four years required a whole new structure to qualification.
So how on earth did FIFA decide on the clubs involved in 2025? Let’s take you through the path UEFA's teams took, but before we do that…
Oh yes, a revamped tournament definitely needs a redesigned trophy — especially one carrying the name of FIFA president Gianni Infantino. Twice.
The all new Club World Cup was designed by FIFA and jewellery brand Tiffany & Co, and unveiled by Infantino alongside U.S. president Donald Trump.
As well as displaying Infantino’s name (twice) the trophy also features the name of all 211 FIFA member nations.
There is a central disc and three outer rings, meaning it can be displayed as a flat shield or opened with a key to reveal “a multifaceted and orbital structure.”
There is a $1billion prize pot to be shared, so you can understand why clubs haven’t kicked up too much of a fuss about participating.
Half of that fund will be allocated to clubs for simply participating, meaning UEFA’s 12 clubs get a slice of $306m.
A ranking “based on sporting and commercial criteria” means European clubs will get between $12.8m and $38.2m just for turning up, while the six South American clubs get a flat fee of $15.2m.
Auckland City, the only Oceania club, will receive $3.58m and for the rest of the clubs it’s $9.55m for qualifying.
That leaves $475m to be shared based on performance, where a perfect tournament on the way to the title would earn $87.62m.
In fact, the final will become the most lucrative game in football with $40m going to the winners and $30m to the losers — exceeding the $47m (€43.5m) on offer in the UEFA Champions League final.
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Clubs are allowed a squad of between 26 and 35 players for the start of the tournament, including three goalkeepers.
Complicating this is that standard player contracts in European club football run from July 1 to June 30 — in other words, ending during the middle of the Club World Cup.
So FIFA has inserted a mid-tournament registration window — June 27 to July 3 — in which teams can replace players whose deals have expired.
Clubs can also add two extra players, upping the squad limit to 37, but squad changes are capped at six for each club during the seven-day window.
From each squad, 26 players can then be named in a matchday squad: 11 starters and 15 substitutes. Five changes can then be made during each match, as well as a concussion replacement if necessary.
Extra time would then increase the limit to six, regardless of how many subs were brought on during the 90 minutes.
In the group stage of the tournament, teams from every confederation have been kept apart — that is except for UEFA and its contingent of 12, evidenced by this match.
Four of the eight groups contain two UEFA clubs: Paris Saint-Germain and Atletico Madrid, Benfica and Bayern Munich, Juventus and Manchester City, plus Red Bull Salzburg and Real Madrid.
But no two clubs from the same country will play each other in the group stage.
Come the knockout stage, teams can play an opponent from any confederation or country — including their own.
For the World Cup lovers among us, the Club World Cup will follow a recognisable pattern.
The 32 teams have been split into eight groups of four, where they will play each other once in the group stage.
The top two teams on points (3 for a win, 1 for a draw) will go through to the knockout stage, while the bottom two clubs will be eliminated.
If clubs are level on points, then the result between the two teams will be used as the first tiebreaker to split them — not goal difference.
The knockout stage begins with the Round of 16, where the group winners will face a different group’s runner-up. The following stages should be familiar from there.
At this point, matches that are level after 90 mins will see 30 minutes of extra time split over two halves. If a match is still a draw at this point, it is penalty shootout time!
One thing you won’t see at this tournament is a third-place play-off. The defeated semi-finalists get to go straight home.

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