European Super League

The European Super League (ESL), organised by the European Super League Company, S.L., is a planned annual club football competition to be contested by 14 European football clubs. It is planned as a breakaway competition to rival/replace the UEFA Champions League, Europe's premier club football tournament organised by UEFA. In addition to the men's competition, the organisation also launched a corresponding women's competition. Plans for the formation of a European Super League were attempted since 1998 but were unsuccessful.

Nasser Al-Khelaifi stepped down as ECA chairman. FIFA and the 4 continental confederations (UEFA, CONCACAF-CONMEBOL, CAF and AFC) all announced they will not be recognizing the new ESL. On 23 April 2021, the ESL announced they will go ahead as planned despite the threats and protest, subsequently resigning from the European Clubs Association (ECA). Due to this, UEFA announced that any of the 14 teams that were to compete in the final 3 rounds of the UEFA club competitions (UCL, UEFA Cup and Cup Winners Cup) will be thrown out of the competition. Liverpool were awarded a 3–0 technical forfeit victory against Real Madrid, Tottenham were awarded a 3–0 technical forfeit victory against Borussia Dortmund.

## **Background**

Proposals for the creation of a new super league competition for European clubs began in 1998, with a concept devised by an Italian corporation, Media Partners. The plan ultimately never progressed pass the planning stage after UEFA moved to expand the Champions League,[9] with various other proposals being brought forward and failing to achieve popular approval  – amongst these included a long-standing ambition by the Premier League to host an overseas "39th game" to capitalise on lucrative overseas markets. In 2009, Florentino Pérez, the president of Real Madrid, commenced plans for a super league competition, as he thought the UEFA Champions League was obsolete and problematic for the sport, and was an obstacle from letting clubs grow their businesses and develop infrastructure.

In 2018, Pérez began discussions with other clubs in Europe, mostly clubs from within Spain, England, and Italy, about the formation of a breakaway competition that would provide strong financial potential for those involved. Those who partook in discussions, conducted in secret, were mainly focused on the exploration of options for the league, unless UEFA produced new reforms for the Champions League that would be acceptable to clubs. The need for a new competition increased in 2020, as big-name football clubs began to suffer financially due to the COVID-19 pandemic, especially with ongoing debts; Pérez's Real Madrid was amongst those hardest hit financially by the pandemic in Spain, which led to him advancing the concept into realisation. The new competition eventually drew interest from American investment banking giant JPMorgan Chase, which pledged $5 billion towards its formation.

On 18 April 2021, Pérez announced the formation of The Super League (also referred to as the "European Super League" (ESL)), via a press release by the 14 clubs who had signed up to be involved. The press release stated an intention to "provide higher-quality matches and additional financial resources for the overall football pyramid" while also "providing significantly greater economic growth and support for European football via a long-term commitment to uncapped solidarity payments which will grow in line with league revenues". Super League chairman Florentino Pérez said that the Super League will help clubs recover lost earnings due to the COVID-19 pandemic

### **Format**

Starting in August, the teams will be spilt into 2 groups of 7, a team plays all other teams in the league home-and-away in a double round-robin format (26 matches) before playing teams in their own group twice (12 matches), for a total of 38 regular games. Fixtures will take during midweeks. The top 4 teams of each group will qualify for the quarter-finals, the remainder of the competition will take place in a 4-week span at the end of the season, with the quarter-finals and semi-finals featuring 2-legged ties, while the final in May will be contested as a single legged tie at a neutral venue. In total, each season of the competition will feature 197 matches (180 in the group stage and 17 in the knockout stage).

### **Leadership**

The launch of the ESL included announcement of the leadership of the organisation. The following table below shows each football executive who became involved in the competition's operations, and their role they held within the sport:

### **Prize money**

The competition will feature uncapped solidarity payments to its clubs, which can increase in line with league revenues. The organisation stated that the solidarity payments will be higher than those of existing European competitions, expected to be "in excess of €10 billion during the course of the initial commitment period of the clubs", and that founding clubs will receive €3.5 billion to support infrastructure investment plans and to offset the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. American investment banking giant JPMorgan Chase is reported to be the major financial backer of the planned Super League, pledging $5 billion towards the competition. According to leaked documents, clubs of the Super League would share 65% of commercial revenues. 20% of revenues would be allocated based on “merit” based on performance in the Super League. And 15% would be shared based on broadcast audience size. Clubs would also be allowed to retain all revenues from gate receipts and club sponsorship deals

### **Teams**

The European Super League consists of 14 teams; similar to G14 an organisation of European football clubs that existed between 1998 and 2008 in fact most teams in the ESL were from G14 either as a founding member or new member with Atletico Madrid and Hoffenheim the only ESL club having no ties to G14. 6 English clubs (Tottenham Hotspur, Liverpool, Chelsea, Man City, Man Utd and Arsenal), Borussia Dortmund and Red Bull Leipzig were all invited but they rejected the invite. The 14 ESL teams signed 23-year legally binding contracts with no "get-out clause".

Lyon Rugby Club - Matmut Stadium (11,000)

### **Ownership**

Suning Holding Group originally owned Inter but sold all their shares to Bain Capital due to COVID-19 pandemic (badly affecting China) and a change of attitude towards football ownership and investment (Xi Jinping is getting 'cold feet' and Chinese football investment is scaling back)

### **TV Rights**

European Super League is shown on beIN Sports (owned by PSG's owner Nasser Al-Khelaifi)

## **Legal issues**

On 19 April 2021, UEFA president Aleksander Čeferin stated that UEFA would begin making "legal assessments" on the following day, and that UEFA would look to ban all 14 Super League clubs "ASAP". However, the Super League informed UEFA and FIFA that they had begun legal action to prevent the competition from being thwarted. Jesper Møller, chairman of the Danish Football Association and UEFA Executive Committee member, stated that he expected the ESL clubs in the quarter-finals of the 2020–21 UEFA Champions League (PSG, Porto, Bayern Munich, Borussia Dortmund and Real Madrid) to be expelled from the competition by 23 April. In addition, he also expected 2 ESL teams to be expelled from the semi-finals of the 2020–21 UEFA Cup and Cup Winners' Cup. However Super League chairman Florentino Pérez said that would be "impossible", and that the law protects them.

Sports lawyer Daniel Geey speculated that the UEFA and the Super League, as well as the ECA, FIFPro, and FIFA, were involved in "a high-stakes game of negotiation", and that the launch of the Super League was not guaranteed. Recalling a conversation with an unidentified lawyer, Sky Sports reporter Geraint Hughes stated that the main arguments for both sides would deal with competition law; UEFA would argue that the Super League would effectively be a closed league and that the clubs in the league were abusing their power, while the Super League would argue that restrictive conditions imposed by UEFA or FIFA would be anti-competitive. Hughes also stated that, in the lawyer's opinion, the Super League would have a slight advantage in a hypothetical case under current EU law; if there was a change in the interpretation of EU law then UEFA could win

The European Commission stated that it does not plan to investigate the Super League for anti-trust violations. Bloomberg columnist Alex Webb argued that the Commission's lack of investigation was justified; if a case against the Super League failed, other parties could interpret the case as condoning the Super League, and the Commission could face popular backlash. On 20 April, a Spanish commercial court in Madrid preliminarily ruled that UEFA, FIFA, and any other associated football body cannot block the launch of the Super League until the court has fully considered the case