Super League Piece

by Zacharie Johnson-Pillon

LAST Sunday, on the 18th of April, Tariq Panja of the New York Times broke the news that 12 European giants were planning to create a breakaway league from the Champions League. These 12 clubs were Real Madrid, FC Barcelona, Atletico Madrid, Juventus, Inter Milan, AC Milan, along with the Premier League Big 6.

Fans, pundits, clubs, governing bodies and government officials alike were quick to condemn this decision prior to any official announcement being made by the clubs who called themselves “the Founding Members”.

The breakaway project came as a reaction to the Champions League reform which was to be voted this past Monday. This reform is supposed to be launched at the start of the 2023/2024 season.

Real Madrid Chairman Florentino Perez, who is at the head of the Super League project, along with Andrea Agnelli from Juventus and Joel Glazer from Manchester United, has said that he deems the new Champions League format to be insufficient. To him, the aim of the Super League is to save football.

But what does football need to be saved from? Could it be corruption, elitism or hypocrisy? Well, not really, according to La Casa Blanca’s representative. No, football needs to be saved from a financial collapse.

These 12 footballing giants, who have apparently suffered huge monetary loss due to the fact their main income stream has become TV rights during the pandemic, decided that in order to increase their income, they needed to create a new, more attractive league, backed by banking magnate J.P. Morgan, in order to draw more eyes around the world to this new product. More eyes, higher value, more money. More money, but who is it for?

European competitions being created by club Chairmen isn’t a novelty. In fact, the Champions League itself was created in April 1955 in Paris by 15 European Club Chairmen, led by Real Madrid’s Santiago Bernabeù, and branded as “La Coupe des Clubs Champions Européens”.

However, this competition was open to everyone, as the modality to enter was: win your domestic league, and you’re in. The Super League is very much different. Indeed, instead of respecting meritocracy which in instilled in the very core of sport’s moral values, the league is based on financial power.

The 12 founding clubs aren’t necessarily the 12 best teams in Europe at this moment in time. AC Milan, Arsenal and Tottenham didn’t qualify for the Champions League this season, the Rossonero and the Gunners failing to do so for numerous years now, whilst Manchester United and Inter Milan were unable to make it past the group stage of this year’s competition. All five of these teams have therefore missed out on considerable amounts of money.

The Super League would allow these teams to avoid all kinds of jeopardy. Their place, as founding members, would be guaranteed every single season, insuring them the same revenue each year.

This is why the idea was seen as abhorrent by the general public. Not necessarily because of the greed shown by the owners of the founding clubs, as the Premier League in particular are no strangers to the idea of “making as much as you possibly can get”. But more so because it goes against what sport is about. It abandons the idea that teams have an equal opportunity to win, the idea that skill and quality are and should be the only difference makers, and that on any given day, the underdog can come out on top. It abandons competition for profit, and profit only. It abandons the romance of football to avoid any potential threat at all costs.

The implications for other clubs in the English football pyramid could have been disastrous had the Big Six decided to also breakaway from the Premier League. The TV rights money would have decreased immensely, meaning there would have been less money for the clubs left in the Premier League. On top of that, clubs looking to come up from the Championship, such as Cardiff City and Swansea City, would probably struggle to avoid relegation, as they wouldn’t have the possibility to compete from a financial standpoint with the other established clubs, due to the sudden drop in TV rights.

Some could argue that this could end up levelling out, but it would do so at the expense of the entire pyramid. If the quality lowered in the Premier League, it would also lower in the other leagues, because their best teams would get promoted when they wouldn’t have usually, ultimately leading to English football becoming less and less attractive.

Unsurprisingly, people were quick to call this competition out for what it is: a travesty. Some may have done it out of interest, such as the football governing bodies concerned by the breakaway, namely the FA and the Premier League in the UK, who could have seen their attractiveness drop tenfold without the Big 6 teams.

Others came from a more honest position. One of the most vocal pundits was Gary Neville, who gave a passionate speech upon hearing the news on Sky Sports.

“It’s been damned and rightfully so.
“I’m disgusted, absolutely disgusted.
“We have to wrestle back the power in this country from the clubs at the top of [the Premier League].
“The fans need protecting.
“It’s a criminal act against them. Deduct points, deduct their money and punish [the clubs].”

Players such as Ander Herrera, Joao Cancelo, Bruno Fernandes, Luke Shaw, Kevin de Bruyne James Milner and the entirety of Liverpool’s squad were some of the players which chose to voice their opinion on the competition, whilst Jurgen Klopp and Pep Guardiola were the most notable coaches to speak out against it.

Fans also made their voices heard. On social media first, the outcry was comparable to the Black Lives Matter movement in June last year. Fans from Big Six and other clubs alike immediately showed their disagreement with the idea of the Super League. Fans of the Big Six teams voiced how ashamed they were to represent their clubs and their owners.

Chelsea supporters took it as far as protesting in front of Stamford Bridge, blocking the access to the stadium for Chelsea’s bus ahead of their game against Brighton on Tuesday night. Petr Cech had to come out of the team bus to ask the fans to let them in. Other Big Six Clubs fans could also take similar actions ahead of their team’s upcoming fixtures.

During the protest, news came out of the BBC stating that Chelsea’s board were preparing documentation in order to leave the Super League, before Manchester City decided to pull the trigger completely. All five remaining English clubs
followed, leading the Super League to crumble.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/56823501

More than ever before, amidst a sanitary crisis that has prevented them from going to games – something the owners definitely took into consideration to announce their decision -, fans proved that football has been, is, and will always be for the fans.

The Super League owners can at least be credited with questioning UEFA and its new Champions League reform. Since 1992, year in which the European Club Champions Cup was rebranded as the Champions League, the inequalities between clubs have been ever-growing. Although it is highly debatable that the owners had any consideration for clubs from smaller countries that have a difficult access to the Champions League, and almost impossible for some, they have allowed the public to realise that the way football has been going for years has got out of control. The new Champions League reform needs to be addressed and fought. And that is something that football fans, which have come together as never before to quell the Super League, can definitely turn their eyes to and unite against.