The ever-increasing women’s football calendar will see the final stage of a brand-new competition play out, the FIFA Women’s Champions Cup, later this week. Approved by the FIFA Council in March 2025, the inaugural Women’s Champions Cup will be completed with four matches taking place on January 28 and February 1, ultimately crowning a winner from the six football confederations across the world. The competition has, in part, already begun. Two of its participants have already crashed out ahead
Approved by the FIFA Council in March 2025, the inaugural Women’s Champions Cup will be completed with four matches taking place on January 28 and February 1, ultimately crowning a winner from the six football confederations across the world.
The competition has, in part, already begun. Two of its participants have already crashed out ahead of the tournament’s crescendo.
Here, The Athletic has all you need to know ahead of this week’s games.
Who is competing? How did they qualify?
For the ‘final phase’, Champions Cup welcomes its UEFA, Concacaf and Conmebol participants, alongside ASFAR of Morocco and the Confederation of African Football (CAF).
That means Arsenal, Gotham FC, Corinthians and ASFAR will battle it out for the right to boast the honour of winning the first ever edition of the Champions Cup.
With a 1-0 victory against Barcelona in Lisbon in May last year, Arsenal won the UEFA Women’s Champions League for just the second time in their history. Stina Blackstenius’ second-half goal sealed the historic win, meaning head coach Renee Slegers would lift silverware in her first year in charge of the WSL side, having replaced Jonas Eidevall early in the campaign.
Arsenal’s run to the final included two comeback victories in the knockout stages, beating Real Madrid 3-2 on aggregate in the quarter-final, having been 2-0 down after the first leg, before overturning a 2-1 first-leg deficit to beat eight-time champions OL Lyonnes 5-3 on aggregate in the semi-final.
Gotham, meanwhile, were the winners of the inaugural Concacaf Women’s Champions Cup, beating Mexican side Tigres 1-0 in a tense final in May, thanks to Esther Gonzalez’s 82nd-minute winner. The NWSL side has also qualified for the semi-finals of this year’s competition, where it will face Club America in May.
Brazilian side Corinthians booked their Champions Cup spot as Conmebol’s representation in the tournament by beating Deportivo Cali 5-3 on penalties after a 0-0 draw in October’s Copa Libertadores Femenina final.
What is the tournament? Where is it?
The Women’s Champions Cup, introduced by FIFA alongside the separate Women’s Club World Cup, pits the six continental club champions against one another. Essentially, the winners of each top-tier continental competition organised by their respective governing body from the previous season: the UEFA Champions League, Concacaf Women’s Champions Cup, and equivalent for each continent.
The Women’s Champions Cup is split into three separate stages: Round 1, Round 2 and the ‘final phase’.
Round 1 was completed back in October, as Wuhan Chegu Jiangda WFC, last season’s AFC Champions League winners, defeated Auckland United, last year’s OFC Champions League winners, 1-0 at Wuhan Sports Centre Stadium.
Round 2, played on December 14, saw Moroccan club, ASFAR — representing CAF — come from 1-0 down to defeat Wuhan Chegu Jiangda 2-1 and book their spot in the final phase, which comprises two semi-finals, a third-placed match and the final.
It was announced in December that Brentford’s 17,250-capacity Gtech Community Stadium will host both semi-finals, taking place on January 28, and Arsenal’s 60,700-capacity Emirates Stadium will be the venue for the third-placed match and final, both taking place on February 1.
Jill Ellis, FIFA’s chief football officer, said, in a briefing attended by The Athletic, that ticket sales, the climate, infrastructure and broadcasting scope were all factored into the decision to host the inaugural Champions Cup in London, while Arsenal’s large fanbase was also considered a useful platform for buy-in to the competition. There will be bidding processes for future editions.
Champions Cup schedule
Semi-final 1
Wednesday, January 28: Gotham FC v Corinthians (12.30pm GMT, 7.30am ET) — Gtech Community Stadium
Semi-final 2
Wednesday, January 28: ASFAR vs Arsenal (6pm GMT, 1pm ET) — Gtech Community Stadium
Third-place match
Sunday, February 1: Runner-up of Semi-final 1 v Runner-up of Semi-final 2 (2.45pm GMT, 9.45am ET) — Emirates Stadium
Final
Sunday, February 1: Winner of Semi-final 1 v Winner of Semi-final 2 (6pm GMT, 1pm ET) — Emirates Stadium
Who is broadcasting the tournament?
FIFA announced on January 15 that Sky Sports had acquired the rights to show the semi-finals, third-placed match and final in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland.
In the United States, DAZN will show both semi-finals on a free-to-air basis, but not the third-placed match nor the final, with FIFA saying in a release that further details for those matches will be released “soon”.
To all worldwide territories outside of the home markets with competing teams in the semi-finals (UK, Brazil, Morocco and the U.S.), DAZN will be broadcasting the four matches for free.
These broadcast deals are only in place for this year’s competition.
Sky Sports has said its coverage of the competition will feature Izzy Christiansen, Caroline Barker, Natalie Gedra, Ellen Ellard and Courtney Sweetman-Kirk.
What do the winners get?
The winners of the inaugural Women’s Champions Cup will earn $2.3million (£1.69m; €1.95m).
FIFA, world football’s governing body, said on top of the “highest single payout ever awarded in women’s football”, the second-placed team will earn $1m and the third- and fourth-placed sides will earn $200,000 for participating in a prize pot totalling $6m.
Meanwhile, Auckland United FC and Wuhan Chegu Jiangda WFC, who were eliminated in the earlier rounds, will receive $100,000 each.
The promised prize money is only $200,000 shy of the $2.5m awarded to the winners of 2025’s global seven-a-side tournament that featured clubs such as Manchester United, Manchester City, winners Bayern Munich and San Diego Wave. By contrast, the women’s Champions League winners last year won €350,000 ($412,417), though money was also distributed in the group stages.
Why is the tournament being played now?
Ellis said the decision to host the Champions Cup in the January-February window was reached as a result of consultations concerning player load, with FIFPro — the global players’ union — and the confederations agreeing it was the best window for the competition to be played.
FIFPro published a study in December finding women’s football has become an increasingly two-speed industry, essentially meaning top-end players were at risk with their schedules becoming too extensive, while on the other end of the scale, players were underloaded through lack of competition outside the elite landscape.
Ellis recognised the challenges of adding a mid-season competition and the concerns that would arise from participating clubs, but suggested it offered an opportunity to utilise their squads in a balanced manner and promote those players who may be underloaded.
There was a short runway between FIFA finalising their plans for the Champions Cup in October and the window in which it was able to be played, making for more difficult negotiations with potential broadcasters. FIFA’s stance, however, was that reaching audiences in order to boost the profile of the Champions Cup would take priority.
The 2027 and 2029 editions of the Champions Cup will also take place in January, with the competition window to be reviewed by FIFA in 2030. The 2028 Club World Cup will also be played in January.
What about the Women’s Club World Cup?
The introduction of the Women’s Champions Cup came alongside the approval of the Women’s Club World Cup, which is set to take place between January 5-30, 2028, following a delay to its original inauguration, which was due for 2026. The competition will take place every four years.
The Women’s Champions Cup will take place annually, but only in the years which the Women’s Club World Cup is not taking place. So, there will be a 2026 Champions Cup, and again in 2027, but the Women’s Club World Cup will take centre stage in 2028, before returning to the Champions Cup for the next three years. Hosts for the 2027 Champions Cup and 2028 Club World Cup have yet to be decided.
Sixteen teams will play at the Women’s Club World Cup, with participants split between ‘direct’ and ‘play-in’ entries — compared to just the six teams which contest the Champions Cup, who directly qualify when winning their respective continental competition.
Five UEFA teams will enter the Club World Cup directly, while Conmebol, Concacaf, AFC, and CAF will each have two participants. Oceania is the only federation to receive no direct entries. It, alongside the other continents, will receive one play-in slot.
The winner of the Champions Cup will not automatically qualify for the Club World Cup.
This article originally appeared in The Athletic.
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