By Petros Lopez, Year 12
Much has been made of the European Super League, a revolutionary breakaway league that would send shockwaves through the world of football. But what would this ambitious project look like, and how would it even work? This article will seek to examine these questions and will get to the bottom of the Super League.
How did this idea come to be?
In April of 2021 the president of Real Madrid, Florentino Perez, announced that Real Madrid and other big European football clubs (including the top European historic football clubs) would break away from the UEFA Champions League to form part of the new Super League. The reasoning behind this decision was that “the formation of the Super League comes at a time when the global pandemic has accelerated the instability in the existing European football economic model. Further, for a number of years, the Founding Clubs have had the objective of improving the quality and intensity of existing European competitions throughout each season, and of creating a format for top clubs and players to compete on a regular basis”. In short, the Super League clubs believe that football is no longer attracting people thus leading to a lack of revenue for the clubs. In order to increase the popularity of the sport, the Super League is a necessity as it would provide exciting and intense games between the best clubs in Europe. Additionally, the Super League states that football is currently monopolized by State owned clubs like PSG (owned by the State of Qatar), and that the Super League would stop this monopoly.
What was the reaction?
The initial Super League proposal was met with outrage from fans, clubs, and the UEFA and FIFA. Due to this, many clubs quickly withdrew from this project, as they were scared of getting punished. The only remaining members were Real Madrid, Barcelona, and Juventus. The UEFA threatened these three clubs with exclusion from the Champions League. Ultimately, the 2021 proposal was shut down within 48 hours and taken to court. On the 21 of December 2023, the European Court of Justice ruled that the UEFA and FIFA acted wrongly and that the European Super League should be allowed to take place. Currently there are mixed feelings within the football community, some fans and clubs are in favor, others severely oppose its creation. The UEFA President, Aleksander Ceferin, is furious as is Nasser Al Khelaifi, President of PSG and President of the European Club Association, following the resignation of the President Agnelli of Juventus FC given the UEFA’s reaction to the proposed Super League.
What is the structure of this new tournament?
The proposed structure in 2021 was that teams would be placed into two groups of ten. Teams would play each other home and away in their groups and this would be followed by a knockout stage. All games would be played in midweek and the competition would run from August until May. There would have been 15 founding clubs which would govern the tournament and 5 other clubs would have to qualify in order to play. This plan was considered unfair as many small teams who play in European competitions would have an extremely hard time qualifying. This was viewed as greedy and selfish. The new proposal submitted by the Super League consists of 3 leagues: Star, Gold, and Blue. The Star and Gold leagues will have 16 clubs grouped into 2 groups of 8, and the Blue league will have 32 clubs grouped into 4 groups of 8. Every team will play 14 matches a season and the top 4 teams in the Star and Gold leagues would go through to a quarter final. In the men’s and women’s Star league, the clubs who finish at the bottom of the two groups will be relegated to the Gold league. In the Gold league the two finalists would be promoted to the Star league. The teams at the bottom of the two Gold league groups will be relegated to the Blue league. In the Blue league, the finalists would be promoted to the Gold league. However, 20 of the 32 clubs will leave the league at the end of their campaign, and be replaced by clubs depending on their domestic league performance. Additionally, a parallel league will be created for women, called the Women’s Super League, with all the same rules applying.
The European Super League was and still is the subject of much debate and controversy. The new proposal is appealing more to fans as it offers free viewing of all the games. While it is accused of being a scheme to make the rich richer, it is also seen by some as a hope for the rejuvenation of football. Will it work? Will it succeed? Only time will tell.
