A dozen powerful football clubs have officially announced that they intend to join the new European Super League as founding clubs.
The Premier League’s ‘Big Six’ – Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool, Manchester City, Manchester United and Tottenham – have today announced their commitment along with European powerhouse clubs Real Madrid, Barcelona, Atletico Madrid, Juventus, AC Milan and Inter Milan as founding members of the new league.
UEFA has hit back saying every club and player participating in the Super League will be banned from all UEFA and FIFA competitions, while further reports suggest UEFA will sue every participating club €50 to 60 billion.
The competition will have 15 ‘Founder Clubs’ (three yet to officially join) and five added teams will qualify annually based on domestic results.
Games will be played mid-week, effectively replacing current European commitments for each club.
In exchange for their commitment, the founding clubs will receive €3.5 billion to support their infrastructure plans and to “offset the impact of the COVID pandemic”.
A statement from the competition described how the competition will work.
The competition is set to begin in August, with the 20 sides being split into two groups of 10, the top three of each group will automatically qualify for the quarter-finals while the teams finishing fourth and fifth will compete in a two-legged play-off for the final quarter-final spots.
A two-legged knockout format will then be used until the final in May, which will be held at a neutral venue.
FIFA has also expressed its disapproval of the Super League’s plans via a statement:
FIFA can only express its disapproval to a closed European breakaway league outside of the international football structures and not respecting the aforementioned principles.
More to come.