European Super League Discussion

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Big rumours are circulating that this will happen. I think it would be better to discuss this in its own thread instead of the Champions League one. If a mod disagrees feel free to close this.

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Shark

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Makes sense, since any Super League discussions will be mixed with the ongoing CL season.
 

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I can add a poll when I'm on my pc but I'm sure it'll be one-sided lol.

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ADRossi

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It's not a surprising development but it's a disappointing development. The big clubs who bring in the most revenue feel as if they deserve to compete in the Champions League over the likes of Atalanta, Leiceister, and West Ham. Of course they have no sporting reason for being able to do so. They just know they hold all the power and therefore are willing to screw over other clubs for personal gain.

Milan are basically the perfect case study for such a league. They're a club that is utterly incompetent in almost every possible way who believe that due to their history they're entitled to compete in a Champions League-type competition, regardless of merit. Why have to fight for a UCL spot when you can simply be assigned one based on a very selective period of history - the 80s through 2000s?

Unfortunately this news is probably a net benefit for Inter. We'll surely be included in this clown show for the indefinite future, guaranteeing us a revenue stream that helps us further separate ourselves from the likes of Roma, Napoli, Lazio, and Atalanta.
 

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Here's a detailed article about it.

Top European Soccer Teams Agree to Join Breakaway League

A group that includes Juventus, Manchester United, Liverpool and Real Madrid has agreed in principle on a plan that would upend the sport’s structures and economics.

LONDON — A group of the world’s richest and most storied soccer clubs has agreed in principle on a plan to create a breakaway European club competition that would, if it comes to fruition, upend the structures, economics and relationships that have bound global soccer for nearly a century.

After months of secret talks, the breakaway teams — which include Real Madrid and Barcelona in Spain; Manchester United, Manchester City, Liverpool and Chelsea in England; and Juventus and A.C. Milan in Italy — could make an announcement as early as Sunday, according to multiple people familiar with the plans.

At least 12 teams have either signed up as founding members or expressed interest in joining the breakaway group, including six from England’s Premier League, three from Spain’s top division and three from Italy’s, according to the people with knowledge of the plans.

European soccer officials moved quickly to try to block the plan. The Premier League condemned the concept in a statement and sent a letter to its 20 member clubs warning them not to take part, and it and the leagues in Spain and Italy held emergency board meetings on Sunday.

Officials at European soccer’s governing body, UEFA, labeled the proposal for a closed super league a “cynical project” in a strongly worded statement that was co-signed by the Premier League, La Liga in Spain and Italy’s Serie A, as well as the soccer federations of each country.

But UEFA also was taking the threat seriously. Its leaders spent the weekend in discussions about its options to block the plan, including potentially banning the breakaway teams from domestic leagues and their players from competing for their national teams in events like the World Cup. And it reminded the breakaway clubs (and, effectively, their players) that FIFA and its six regional confederations already had made a similar threat.

“We will consider all measures available to us, at all levels, both judicial and sporting in order to prevent this happening,” the UEFA statement said. “Football is based on open competitions and sporting merit; it cannot be any other way.”

Still, UEFA also has begun contacting lawmakers at the European Union, hoping the bloc would be able to strengthen its hand in preserving the status quo.

The teams committed to the super league plan are, for the moment, limited to a dozen clubs from Spain, Italy and England. A cohort of six teams from the Premier League — United, Liverpool, Manchester City, Arsenal, Chelsea and Tottenham — represents the biggest grouping from a single country. Atlético Madrid is the other team from Spain that is said to have endorsed the project, while the Milan rivals Internazionale and A.C. Milan would join Juventus as Italy’s representatives.

But the leaders of the breakaway group have been trying to get other top teams, like Germany’s Bayern Munich and Borussia Dortmund and the French champion Paris St.-Germain, to commit. But to date those clubs — and others — have declined to walk away from the domestic structures and Continental competitions that have underpinned European soccer for generations.

P.S.G., for example, has been invited to join but has so far resisted the overtures. Its president, Nasser al-Khelaifi, sits on the UEFA board and also heads beIN Media Group, the Qatar-based television network that has paid millions of dollars to UEFA for the right to broadcast Champions League games.

The New York Times contacted a number of clubs involved in the breakaway plans but all declined to comment or did not respond. But the Premier League wrote to its 20 clubs after a board meeting on Sunday, warning them that the league’s rules bar clubs from joining outside competitions without approval and urging them to “walk away” from the idea.

“This venture cannot be launched without English clubs and we call upon any club contemplating associating themselves or joining this venture to walk away immediately before irreparable damage is done,” it said in a letter to the teams.

The timing of Sunday’s news appeared designed to overshadow UEFA’s plan to ratify a newly designed Champions League on Monday. That competition would be decimated by the departure of its biggest teams.

The repercussions of a split between European soccer and its best-known, best-followed and richest clubs would be seismic for all involved. Without the top teams, UEFA and the leagues would face demands for millions of dollars in refunds from the broadcasters who pay billions for television rights to tournaments. The clubs would lose revenue streams that could cripple their budgets as European soccer continues to emerge from the financial wreckage caused by the coronavirus pandemic, and any ban on national team play could affect their ability to recruit top talent.

Among the most notable teams involved in the breakaway group is Juventus, the serial Italian champion. Its chairman, Andrea Agnelli, also leads the European Club Association, an umbrella body for more than 200 top division clubs, the majority of which will be left out of the proposed Super League. He is also a member of UEFA’s executive board. When asked by The Times this year to discuss his role in the talks of a breakaway league, Agnelli brushed off the idea as a “rumor.”

Still, according to documents reviewed by The Times in January, plans for the breakaway league had gathered pace since the summer. Top clubs sought to take advantage of uncertainty in the soccer industry caused by the pandemic to forge a new path that would ensure a degree of financial stability for them but would also almost certainly lead to a significant — and potentially devastating — loss in value and revenue for teams excluded from the project.

Each of the would-be permanent members of the proposed super league are being promised 350 million euros, or $425 million, to sign up, the documents said.

Under the proposals reviewed at the time, the super league, which would play its matches in the middle of the week, sought to secure 16 top soccer franchises as permanent members and to add four qualifiers from domestic competitions. The clubs would be split into two groups of 10, with the top four teams in each group qualifying for the knockout stages, culminating in a final that would take place on a weekend.

The event would, according to the documents, generate hundreds of millions of dollars in additional revenue for the participating teams, which are already the richest clubs in the sport. (An alternative version of the plan proposed 15 permanent members and five qualification spots.) The group had entered into discussions with JPMorgan Chase & Co. to raise financing for the project, according to people with knowledge of the matter. The firm has so far declined to comment.

UEFA found a powerful ally in opposition to the plans in FIFA, soccer’s global governing body. FIFA warned that any player who took part in such an unsanctioned league would be banned from appearing in the World Cup. The statement came after UEFAs president, Aleksander Ceferin, demanded support from his FIFA counterpart, Gianni Infantino, amid mounting speculation that the breakaway would have FIFA’s backing.

European soccer leaders huddled on the telephone and in video conferences over the weekend to forge a counterattack. However, finding a solution to the potential loss of the biggest brands in soccer is not an easy task. The Premier League, for example, would lose much of its sheen — and almost certainly a lot of the commercial appeal that has turned it into the richest league in soccer — should it move to banish its top six teams.

As member-owned clubs, Barcelona and Real Madrid would likely require the support of the thousands of their supporters before formally joining, and any German clubs that agree to take part would face similar obstacles. All can expect heavy internal opposition; fan groups from across Europe had already voiced opposition since details of the plans for a super league emerged earlier this year.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/18/sports/soccer/super-league-united-liverpool-juventus-madrid.html?
 

.h.

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this will never happen.

it's just an bargaining tactic to get the CL re-formatted in the way they want.
 

IM21

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Perhaps Roma can now finally win serie a.
 

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this will never happen.

it's just an bargaining tactic to get the CL re-formatted in the way they want.

Based on rumours of the proposed re-formatted CL it seems like it would be very similar to a european super league, so this would happen regardless though. Look at the proposed rule that teams would qualify for the CL based on club popularity alone.
 

.h.

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Based on rumours of the proposed re-formatted CL it seems like it would be very similar to a european super league, so this would happen regardless though. Look at the proposed rule that teams would qualify for the CL based on club popularity alone.

Yep. They'll just want to tip the financials/timing/country allocations/whatever the way they want. Empty threats. Nothing will come of it, I bet.
 

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this will never happen.

it's just an bargaining tactic to get the CL re-formatted in the way they want.

Already getting their way, with the new format having places for historical merit :palm:
 

.h.

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Yep, they're looking to manipulate something further clearly. Time will tell what it is.
 

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Yep, they're looking to manipulate something further clearly. Time will tell what it is.

Agreed, especially with the Champions League floating some changes in the format. The " big clubs" probably want a greater share of the take and don't have to play in the earlier rounds, like a guaranteed final 16 slot or something ridiculous. Heaven forbid they should lose to Ajax, Lyon, Leicester, Atalanta or Shakhtar in early group stages.
 

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Agreed, especially with the Champions League floating some changes in the format. The " big clubs" probably want a greater share of the take and don't have to play in the earlier rounds, like a guaranteed final 16 slot or something ridiculous. Heaven forbid they should lose to Ajax, Lyon, Leicester or Shakhtar in early group stages.

nah, theres no risk of a big club ever having that problem.
 

CafeCordoba

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Big clubs' biggest problem in CL is it's not 100% certain every season. Few big clubs will be out of it every season in EPL (yes, Arsenal and Tottenham are big clubs when it comes to revenues). Now in Italy there is a legit chance Juve might not make it (small but still legit chance).

Big money hates nothing more than uncertainty.

And I understand this viewpoint in a sense that it's hard to make budgets for next fiscal year when the CL spot isn't a guarantee. Hard to invest to the team when considerable part of the revenues are uncertain in the coming years.

But this closed super league bullshit is just DISGUSTING. Please no to this american sports model.
 

Earth

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It's embarrassing that we're involved in this shitshow.
 

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Don't forget Agnelli is the main guy behind this, if you ever needed any further proof on how fucked up this is. It's even funnier now that this news comes about when juventus have a real chance of not making a champions league spot this season.

Also, good on Bayern and Dortmund for declining the proposal. When even Bayern, a team that steamrolls their league every season, rejects this...you know it's not a great idea.
 

Glass box

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Further destabilization of the club engaging in such abominable ideas is just what we need right now.
 

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Don't forget Agnelli is the main guy behind this, if you ever needed any further proof on how fucked up this is. It's even funnier now that this news comes about when juventus have a real chance of not making a champions league spot this season.

Also, good on Bayern and Dortmund for declining the proposal. When even Bayern, a team that steamrolls their league every season, rejects this...you know it's not a great idea.

And imagine how funny it is really. Juve won't make it to top 8 in the Super League I'm telling you. They are changing their perennial Scudetti or now Scudetto battles to fighting to be in top 10 or something in this plastic league of cocksuckers. :lol:
 
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