The inaugural FIFA Club World Cup 2025™ is a tournament where dreams come true, and for Jack McFawn, a 14-year-old goalkeeper from Salt Lake City, the tournament has given him the chance to fulfil his life-long dream of watching Paris Saint-Germain in the flesh.

When Achraf Hakimi scored PSG’s second goal against Seattle Sounders to seal their qualification to the knockout rounds, Jack was in the stands celebrating a moment nine years in the making.

Jack fell in love with football from an early age. He started playing at three-years-old, developing into a goalkeeper who now stands guard between the posts in Utah’s junior leagues. It didn’t take long for Jack to declare his allegiance to PSG, becoming an adoring fan at just five-years-old.

He can even pinpoint the moment he became a convert, sitting down with his parents to watch a Ligue 1 match in 2016 and being mesmerised by the likes of Zlatan Ibrahimović, Edinson Cavani and Ángel Di María as they defeated Olympique de Marseille 2-1.

Being in the stands of Lumen Field was the culmination of the past nine years of fandom, beating a 2022 visit to Parc des Princes where he toured the changing rooms and watched the FIFA World Cup™ final on television.

“It was a really fun experience seeing the stadium, getting to see the locker room with seats for Lionel Messi and Kylian Mbappé and seeing the cut-outs of players up on the glass,” said Jack.

“I went during the FIFA World Cup 2022 in Qatar, so I wasn’t able to watch any PSG games in the stadium, but I was able to watch the final on a screen with a group of fans.”

Back in the United States, Jack travelled nearly 830 miles from Salt Lake City to Seattle for the FIFA Club World Cup match-up where he was surrounded by opposition fans: the majority of the 50,628-crowd cheering on home-town club, Seattle.

It was PSG and Jack who went home happy though, with the 2-0 victory assuring the European champions top spot in Group B and giving Jack a memory that will stay with him forever.

“I got the tickets as a Christmas present: my parents put the tickets in a super big box so it would just get lower and lower like a Russian doll, and I was just ecstatic when I learned that I was getting to see PSG play in the United States.

“It was really fun getting to see all the players, really getting the scale of how tall they are and getting to see the players just playing. It’s so much different than watching it on TV.

“The two goals that we scored are going to be my highlight that I’ll think about for a while.”

To amplify the experience, Jack’s father was able to organise a meet-up with fellow Paris fans ahead of the match, with the pair attending a PSG fan event in Seattle.

“It was fun getting to be part of the PSG family for a little bit, getting to be around the PSG supporters and getting to see them play in person. It’s an experience that I have hoped for since I was really small.”

While Jack’s story is an individual one, it represents the story of thousands and encapsulates exactly what the FIFA Club World Cup is about: making dreams come true for players, coaches, clubs and – importantly – fans.

Bringing 32 of the world’s best clubs also means bringing together 32 sets of the world’s most passionate fans, all watching their beloved teams compete for the title of world champions. And for some of those fans, just like Jack, it means getting to see their heroes in the flesh for the first time.