Blog: Is the European Super League a necessary evil?
On April 18th, 2021, the news of the European super league sent shockwaves around the world. The fans were shocked and left feeling betrayed by their favourite clubs. Thousands of fans protested outside the stadiums of their respective clubs. The media ran a campaign against these clubs rightly accusing them of greed and taking advantage of loyal fans. This all felt very hypocritical as they were the first to take advantage of the working-class fans, by setting ludicrous prices for their services. After the continuous backlash from fans, media, UEFA, and politicians, most of the clubs pulled out with only Real Madrid, Barcelona, and Juventus remaining.
However, I believe this is not the end of Super league and it might be a necessary evil needed in football.
The criticism of the European Super League came as many believed the competition was a sign of elitism and also lacked competition as the founding members would have a guaranteed place, regardless of domestic performance. The fans hated the “Americanisation” of the sport. However, in their most recent release, outlining their plans for a new format, the European Super league stated that there would be no permanent members, teams would qualify based on domestic league position. There would also be a second tier, with 20 more teams, mirroring the Europa League, to the Super League’s Champions League.
Football organisations such as the English FA, Premier League and UEFA were outraged at the European Super League when in fact, they started all this greed. The Premier League pretends to care about fans. For example, they set games on a Monday at 20:00 for fans who live across the country who will have to pay additional costs for accommodation due to the late kick off. The Premier League also opened its door for billionaire business-men to own teams, who only cared about profits, so a European Super League seemed inevitable, and in fact, it was the Premier League’s own doing. Additionally, the hypocrisy of UEFA was very ironic. They accused these football club owners for only caring about profits, when at the same time, a lot of their former officials are currently serving prison time for accepting bribes.
When the European Super League was disbanded, UEFA rewarded PSG with no economic sanctions, so they took away the Financial Fair Play rule for 2 years. The only reason why PSG did not join the aforementioned project was because their owner Naseer El Khalifi did not want to get into a legal battle with UEFA over the 2022 World Cup, which will take place in his country, Qatar. The lack of economic sanctions allowed PSG to sign superstars like Lionel Messi who is reportedly on £1 million pounds a week, in addition to Neymar Jr and Kylian Mbappe who are reportedly on £602,000 and £413,000 each respectively. The PSG wage bill comes to a total amount of £260 million pounds which is a larger sum than the value of 17 other Ligue 1 clubs.
I think the media and UEFA did a fantastic job of making Florentino Perez, president of the Super League, look like a villain when he was in fact looking to save the future of Europe’s elites. The media broadcasters such as Sky and BT brainwashed the fans into thinking they cared about them, when in fact they were just looking out for themselves. A European Super League would’ve put them out of business.
A Super League is inevitable in football. There is too much money involved for it not to, especially with many clubs feeling the detrimental financial effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. Football clubs want to be able to control their own future and not let organisations such as UEFA or the Premier League control them. I believe that if the Super League doesn’t happen in the near future, then the English clubs will just monopolize Europe in years to come, due to their overwhelming fortune, which other elite European clubs can’t compete with. The Premier league has the highest TV money, the best managers in the world, as well as the best footballing talents. The recent takeover of Newcastle further signifies the financial dominance we are going to witness by the Premier league.
Premier league clubs are spending at will whilst many European superpowers such as Inter Milan, Barcelona and Bayern Munich are feeling the effects of the pandemic and are unable to compete with the Premier League transfer fees and wage bills.
Despite winning the Serie A Inter Milan incurred losses of around £84 million in 2020 and this will reportedly rise to £127 to £178 million by the end of 2021. The club have already sold Achraf Hakimi to Paris Saint-Germain for a reported sum of £50 million as well as star striker Romelu Lukaku to Chelsea for a hefty sum of 97.5 million. This pretty much sums up the poor financial position of many European giants.
The TV revenue of the premier league winner Manchester city was £153.9 million in 2020/21 compared to the Bundesliga 2020/21 winners who made £105 million and is expected to go down to £90 million in the 21/22 season. The lowest TV revenue in the premier league was a hefty £91 million received by the bottom club Sheffield United. Compared that to the lowest TV revenue in the Bundesliga was a measly £34 million by Arminia Bielefeld. The European clubs cannot compete with that money.
Personally, I was against the old, proposed format of the European super league as it was a sign of elitism and lack of competition as the founding members will get automatic qualification. However, the proposed format of no permanent members and the qualification being earned through the domestic leagues has changed my mind and made me a fan of the project. Furthermore, the European Super League has promised cheaper streaming services for games for the fans, which will be great news for the people who pay up to £89 a month in the UK to watch every game legally. Additionally, the European Super League will finally put an end to UEFA’s monopoly and corruption. UEFA are pretending like the European Super League is about money when they want to change the format of the current Champions league from 32 to 36 teams for the same reason. This would mean that each team may have to play up to 10 games, which will obviously increase the chances of players getting injured significantly, as well as it will make it near enough impossible for players to recover after games. Finally, the European Super League referees will have a mic so fans can see and understand every decision they’re making so there is no confusion and outrage among them.
Maybe in the end, the idea of a Super League was not as bad as everyone first feared, however, its implementation left a lot to be desired. With the new and improved format, I am firmly of the belief that its introduction to the beautiful game is an inevitability.
- written by @ Hxyyyxn04_
