It’s an earthquake on the football planet. Sunday evening, twelve powerful European clubs, in the wake of the real MadridJuventus Turin and the two Manchester clubs (City and United), the engines of reform, have announced a separatist project aimed at creating a whole new competition on the sidelines of European (UEFA) and world (FIFA) bodies.
Called “Super League”, the competition had been the subject of many rumors for years, a sea serpent agitated by the strongholds of the round ball to influence the decisions of the organizers. What does the project contain? Why is it emerging now? Eco decoding.
What could change?
The “Super League” would consist of the organization of a closed championship of 20 clubs where there would be 15 permanent members, plus 5 guests each season. The competition would thus bring together the elite of football to offer the most beautiful posters each week. Among the founding members who came out of the woodwork on Sunday evening by press release, we find the 3 Spanish strongholds (Real Madrid, FC Barcelona, Atletico Madrid), 6 English teams (Arsenal, Chelsea, Tottenham, Manchester City, Manchester United and Liverpool) and 3 Italian clubs (Inter Milan, AC Milan and Juventus Turin) led by Andrea Agnelli, president of Juve and just resigned president of the European Club Association (ECA). It is he, the heir to the Fiat empire, who is the real driving force behind the project.
Andrea Agnelli, president of Juventus Turin and the European Club Association (ECA) during the Italian Cup final against AC Milan on May 9, 2018 in Rome
afp.com/TIZIANA FABI
The matches would take place in the middle of the week, with all clubs able to take part in their respective national championships. According to the plans devised by its promoters, the season would begin in August, with the clubs divided into two pools of ten, with home and away matches. The first three clubs from each group would qualify for the quarter-finals. The fourth and fifth-placed teams would compete for the remaining quarter-final spots. An eliminatory phase being played in home and away matches would make it possible to reach the final. This will take place at the end of May, in a neutral stadium. The formula would therefore offer 180 matches per season, almost double the current Champions League formula.
What financial arrangement?
From a financial point of view, the promoters of the Super League are taking matters into their own hands and would do without bodies such as UEFA, one of whose purposes is to ensure a form of financial solidarity by helping the European federations with the money generated by the competitions. However, in the business plan of the Super League, it would be the participants who would capture a major share of the revenue. Indeed, one third of the income would be shared between the 15 permanent members; another third distributed among the 20 teams selected each season; around 20% based on sports results and 15% allocated based on notoriety and TV audiences. In total, the organizers guarantee an annual check of at least 350 million euros to the founding members.
“It’s really just a question of money, pure business. The organizers are talking about 5 billion euros in cumulative revenue and that doesn’t seem exaggerated to me. Now the real question is who will put this envelope on the table?” asks Pierre Maes, consultant and author of Football TV rights business (FYP). For this specialist, it is not towards the TV channels that it is necessary to look, but rather towards the funds of private equity. See the states themselves like Saudi Arabia, always in search of strengthening its soft power and existing against Qatari and Emirati rivals.
If the rights business is also going through a period of crisis, like the Mediapro fiasco in France, it is also because the broadcasters have been wrung out. “There is nothing left in the cash, we have to get the money elsewhere,” warns a specialist in international negotiations. This is why the bank JP Morgan was mandated by the supporters of the Super League to go and find funds. She could herself participate in the tour de table.
Why now ?
Two elements accelerated communication from Super League supporters. First, there is the financial situation of European football. Affected by the health and financial crisis, football clubs have lost a lot of money because of the Covid. PSG alone has announced a provisional budget deficit of 200 million euros for this season. Overall, European clubs would have lost more than 5 billion euros in turnover over the two seasons impacted by the Covid. But this is exactly the budget on which the organizers of the Super League are working.
Photo provided by UEFA of the Champions League Round of 16 draw on December 14, 2020 at the institution’s headquarters in Nyon, Switzerland
afp.com/Harold Cunningham
But the other decisive element is in Nyon, Switzerland, at the headquarters of UEFA. This Monday, the organization was to present a project to reform its flagship competition, the Champions League. Instead of tightening it as the Super League clubs want, the body wanted to go from 2024 from 32 clubs to 36 clubs, by drastically increasing the number of matches (96 to 180 matches). The current Champions League formula redistributes €2 billion out of the €3.2 billion in annual commercial revenue it generates. Last year, for its journey to the Champions League final, PSG received around 130 million euros in earnings and bonuses. The Super League is therefore trying to influence new reforms by promising a much more profitable competition.
What could hinder its arrival?
The separatists may have to hang on. For their new competition to come out one day on earth, the set will have to be attractive. However, several clubs are likely to miss the call. In France, PSG has been approached and if the club was seduced by the idea of an alternative project last winter, the timing is very unfavorable. Property of Qatar, the latter is in the final stretch of preparation for its Football World Cup in 2022, the symbol par excellence of its success. Even of its geopolitical existence. Qatar hand in hand with Fifa, there is no question for PSG of participating in the secession of the institutions that the founders of the Super League hope to achieve.
Another element, the Qatari channel beIN Sports, piloted by the president of PSG, Nasser Al-Khelaifi, is also an actor in the international broadcasting of the current Champions League. It is therefore unlikely that the group will shoot themselves in the foot by robbing UEFA. “The PSG nevertheless remains in ambush in the medium term”, blows a connoisseur of the world of football.
In Germany, the mighty Bayern Munich, last champions league winner but eliminated the week behind by PSG, also said he was opposed. Whether in France or Germany, the public authorities have reiterated their hostility to this type of project.
Real Madrid president Florentino Perez arrives at his hotel in Cardiff the day before the C1 final against Juventus on June 2, 2017
afp.com/JAVIER SORIANO
Finally, the main driver of the Super League, the president of Real Madrid, the businessman Florentino Perez, will have to convince his shareholders. However, the club has belonged since 1902 to its supporters, the “socios”, a particular model which allows everyone to vote for the election of the president and to take part in the General Assemblies of the club. There are 90,000 socios in Madrid, and almost as much in the Spanish rival of FC Barcelona which also has a similar organization where the power is in fact in the hands of the supporters.
If the Super League is debated and should find aficionados, will the project collect the majority? “We have a romantic, almost nostalgic view of football in Europe. But I’m not sure there isn’t a demand for such a product. It’s a guarantee of seeing the best of the best in football and the clubs are no longer hiding. This type of project seems inevitable”, sums up Pierre Maes. “It’s cynical as a project, but it’s also the meaning of history. The richest clubs have been carrying this idea for 30 years. The crisis has only accelerated things”, concludes a former manager of French clubs. With whom will the rest of the history of European football be written?
What legal consequences?
The promoters of the future League said they were “worried” about the reaction of UEFA and Fifa to the announcement of the creation of its competition. On Sunday, UEFA threatened to exclude rebellious clubs from national and international competitions, while Fifa said on Monday “disapprove of a closed and dissident European League.
“Your press release obliges us to take protective actions to secure ourselves against such an unfavorable reaction (…) which would be illegal”, explains the Super League. “It is our duty to ensure that all available actions to protect the interests of the competition and our decision-makers are duly taken.”
“We do not want to replace the Champions League or the Europa League, but to compete with them and exist alongside these tournaments”, added the representatives of the organization, urging the authorities to “urgently participate in discussions”. Will this new competition be able to “accommodate within the football ecosystem”, as its promoters are now asking? The soap opera is just beginning.