'For that tournament, we are all united as one' - Club World Cup transforms U.S. into global soccer hub for fans from 130 countries

Auckland City’s story will go down in footballing lore. The semi-pro team from Sandringham, a suburb of Auckland, are on an entirely different level to the kind of heavyweight teams they are facing in this tournament. Some of their players are literally taking unpaid leave from their jobs to play this summer. And their fans, in turn, have turned up in force.

It shouldn’t come as a shock that there isn’t a following of the club in the United States. But that hasn’t deterred the locals from the island nation, who have made the journey in a show of support. Blair Shaw is one such example.

A youth soccer coach who volunteers with the club on the weekend, he and nearly 30 others paid out of their own pockets to follow the team - which plays in a home stadium with a capacity of 3,500. Shaw says he spent more than $10,000 for what will in all likelihood be just three group games in the United States - including their CWC opener, in which Auckland City got, well, blasted by Bayern Munich, 10-0.

But for him and his small but mighty contingent, it’s worth every single penny.

“Because it's such a big event, and it may be the only one we ever get to go to, a lot of people spent a lot of money and sacrificed a lot to actually get here and make it happen,” he said. “So it’s really, really, really special.”

Some followers have come in more significant numbers. Al Ahly are the biggest club in North Africa, by both value and trophy count. This is a historic setup that gets little attention in the U.S. - such is the largely Eurocentric attitude that the country has towards soccer.

But the opening match of the tournament rubbished that notion. An estimated 40,000 Al Ahly fans poured into Hard Rock Stadium in Florida for a 0-0 draw with Inter Miami in the kickoff match of the Club World Cup, and thousands more gathered elsewhere during the game. Miami manager Javier Mascherano, who is used to away games featuring heavy fanbases for his own club, remarked that it was actually a hostile environment for his club to play in.

“We knew we were up against a strong team...The nerves and anxiety played a trick on us in the first half,” he admitted.

Ahmadi is glad the rest of the world took notice.

“I believe it was a good surprise for all football followers when they found out the amount of people,” he said, “how it was massive against Inter Miami.”

It was a chance, for him, to see plenty of supporters he has met in person while traveling to other games in other countries, as well as put faces to names he had connected with online for years. He estimated that 1,000 people he already knew were in attendance - some of them he hadn’t connected with in a long while.

“From my network, I have met about 1,000 of my friends, some of them we haven’t seen for 10-15 years,” he said.

And then there are the new connections.

“I’m staying at a hotel where I met many new friends from the Netherlands, from Egypt, from Saudi Arabia, from the Emirates, from Kuwait, from the UK,” he said. “We met by chance. We have never met before, but by chance. We all came for the same reason.”

Shuga Mabunda retired in 2021. But he hasn’t quite been able to let Mamelodi Sundowns go. He and the club have an excellent relationship to this day, the former defensive midfielder taking on an ambassadorial role for the team. And for the summer, the South African giants have enlisted him as not only their biggest fan but also the perfect influencer - the man both behind and in front of the camera.

“The vibe is always great, especially because being able to see local or South African football team competing globally is always what every every person wanted to see,” Mabunda said.

Mabunda has chronicled his journey over recent days. Here he is making friends with Ah Ahly fans. There he goes talking to a plausibly inebriated man in a Brazil shirt, who, somehow, has not only seen the Sundowns play, but also is also a good friend of their center forward.

“Let’s go together to Brazil!,” the unnamed fan remarks. “Arthur Sales, I know him! Very good player, very nice guy!”

And it’s not just the locals. Mabunda is expecting a fine traveling contingent, too.

“South Africans are reaching out and saying ‘We want to come to the games, we want to come and support,’ “ he said. “We definitely know that we will have people chanting and supporting the club.”

Park Yeeun is a manager at HD Hyundai. For years, the company has had close ties with Ulsan HD, one of two Asian clubs represented in the Club World Cup. Their following in their native Korea is massive. In America, the club’s impact is comparatively small.

Ulsan HD’s marketing is robust enough, but their solution has been to interact with the fans in other ways. Park and other HD Hyundai employees have followed Ulsan fans throughout their K-League campaign to date, and introduced a contest for supporters to collect stamps at various fixtures. With seven stamps, they are eligible to enter a team vote to pick which fans can travel to the U.S for the CWC.

“The Uslan HD players selected the fans, and they have the same passion and energy as us,” Park said.

There will be others, in larger numbers, but Park insists that it can be a perfect way to incentivize fans to get involved.

“We hope this tournament marks the beginning of a new chapter,” Kim Subin, co-worker of Park and also a manager at HD Hyundai, said.

Adriano Batista Branco moved to the United States in 2023 for work. He settled in Brooklyn and found that he had relatively few opportunities to watch his team, Palmeiras. There were no fleshed-out supporter groups - and certainly not a centralized body sponsored by the club. A social media search yielded nothing, so he started his own account, PalmeirasNY, in the hope of connecting with other fans in the community.

He could not have predicted what happened next. A chance meeting at a bar saw him introduced to another fan of the team. And things have spiked since. They now have 18,000 followers and have been officially acknowledged as the Palmeiras consulate in New York.

Their group is a real mix. Some are second-generation Brazilians who sought a way to watch their team remotely. Others are on shorter-term stays. A fair few are just dropping in for a day or two on their American travels.

“It’s very hard when you move from Brazil to another place,” Batista Branco said. “It’s a different culture, it's not your own language. We make this spot a place where people can feel at home, feel like they are at the stadium with the same vibe and atmosphere.”

Palmeiras’ game against Porto on Sunday was the biggest club event in their history. Batista Branco didn’t want it to merely be a trip to a football match.

Instead, he prepared a frenzy of activities and services. He insisted that there be buses for fans from Legends Bar in midtown Manhattan to MetLife Stadium in New Jersey. He organized an event in Times Square that briefly broke the Internet. Anticipating an influx of tourists, Batista Branco pieced together a boat tour around the edge of Manhattan, with a visit to the Statue of Liberty to round it off.

Of course, the U.S. hosting this global event has come with political tensions. Last week, concerns were raised when the Department of Homeland Security said border patrol agents would "provide security" for the Miami-Al Ahly match - especially in the midst of nationwide protests.

CBP is often involved in security operations in the lead-up to major events in the U.S., such as the Super Bowl. ICE officers, who also operate under DHS, are primarily tasked with identifying and arresting individuals who violate U.S. immigration law.

Palmeiras’ fan group spans social class, and given recent immigration raids, Batista Branco indicated a number of regulars dropped out, saying, “They have never seen Palmeiras play… they were afraid of something happening, and that's why they did not go. That was very sad to hear.”

But beyond that, the Palmeiras supporter said he hopes that the tournament is remembered for the fan experience as a whole.

“What’s dominating our experience is what you saw at the stadium, that vibe,” Batista Branco said.

Football fans are eternal optimists. You have to be to travel thousands of miles - and spend thousands of dollars - just to cheer on your team in person. But for most, getting out of their groups would be an achievement.

Palmeiras set themselves up well with a draw against Porto, but Inter Miami and Ah Ahly won’t be easy. Ulsan and Mamelodi have to contend with German powers Dortmund and perennial Brazilian winners Fluminense. Auckland City, for all of the good vibes around their story, conceded 10 against Bayern Munich - and Harry Kane didn’t even score.

Still, this isn't about winning, entirely. Instead, it’s largely about the journey, the chance to see their clubs play in a world-wide tournament in the U.S., take on opponents they otherwise would have zero chance of facing, and show that football - their version of it - is worth everyone’s attention.

“All of us are organized, united,” Batista Branco said. “Even though we can have different thoughts, different ways of thinking. For that tournament, we are all united as one.”