By Yusef Taylor, @FlexDan_YT
A statement issued by “The Super League” has announced that “Leading European Football Clubs Announce New Super League Competition” which will break away from Europe’s highly popular European Champions League.
The statement issued on Sunday 18th April 2021 reads that “twelve of Europe’s leading football clubs have today come together to announce they have agreed to establish a new mid-week competition, the Super League, governed by its Founding Clubs.”
At the moment the main European Club Competition is the UEFA Champions League and the UEFA Europa League which sees the best clubs in Europe compete in a playoff competition where clubs progress in different rounds.
The 12 clubs which have been included in the announcement as Founding Clubs are “AC Milan, Arsenal FC, Atletico de Madrid, Chelsea FC, FC Barcelona, FC Internazionale Milano, Juventus FC, Liverpool FC, Manchester City, Manchester United, Real Madrid CF and Tottenham Hotspur”.
In addition to the 12 Founding Clubs, the statement highlighted that “a further three clubs will join ahead of the inaugural season, which is intended to commence as soon as practicable”.
Europe’s Governing Football organisation, UEFA have released a statement announcing that clubs participating in the Super League could be banned from their domestic league and the Premier League has issued a statement condemning the proposal. It’s alleged that the world’s governing football organisation, FIFA, could ban players in the Super League from representing their National Team.
The statement from UEFA read: “as previously announced by FIFA and the six Confederations, the clubs concerned will be banned from playing in any other competition at domestic, European or world level, and their players could be denied the opportunity to represent their national teams.”
However, it appears football club President’s are backing the move which will see clubs share a greater investment pot close to €3.5 Billion Euros from United States-based bank JP Morgan. News reports indicate that the Super League’s first President will be Real Madrid Club President Florentino Perez.
Critics of the move have claimed that the closed-door competition is against the ethics of sports competition and merit. The Premier League statement highlighted that the proposal “attacks the principles of open competition and sporting merit which are at the heart of the domestic and European football pyramid.”
It’s believed that a closed Super League will make it difficult for clubs outside the competition to be promoted into the Super League while clubs inside the Super League will rarely face relegation, killing the competitive nature of football as we know it.