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European Super League: backlash builds against breakaway plan – live!

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The president of the IOC Thomas Bach has also come out against the European Super League this morning, warning that: “In this polarising environment, narrow self-interest and egotism are gaining ground over solidarity, shared values and common rules.”

Bach stressed that he supported European Sports Model, where money went to the grassroots and success was based on merit. But speaking at the Uefa congress. Bach warned that such a model was under threat from the “purely profit-driven approach that ignores the intrinsic values and social mission of sport.”

“It is under threat because the social mission of sport organisations is losing ground to the purely profit-oriented goals of commercial sport providers and investors,” he added. “If everything is only looked at from a business perspective, if only the economic rules are applied to measure the impact of sport on society, then the social mission of sport is lost.”

Bastian Schweinsteiger (@BSchweinsteiger)

If the #SuperLeague will be realized, it will destroy football with its national leagues as we know it and this is a very sad thought to me.

April 19, 2021

That’s much stronger than anything Infantino has said previously. He didn’t say anything about banning ESL players from international competition, though it can, at a push, be read into his half-in, half-out point. Either way, he understands the gravity of the situation, which makes you think that he’ll use all power and sanction available to him to make sure he wins. Whether or not that’s enough, who knows.


“At FIFA, we can only and strongly disapprove the creation of the super league, of a super league which is a closed shop, which is a breakaway from the current institutions. No doubt whatsoever of Fifa’s disapproval. Full support to Uefa.”

“It is my task and our task to protect the European sports model, club competitions, national teams. If they choose to go their own way, they must live with their choice. They are either in or out. They cannot be half-in and half-out.”

“My task, our task, is to save club football, international football.”


“I feel it is only right that, as CEO of your football club, I write to you directly following the plans made public over the weekend for a European Super League.

As a proud custodian of Everton, I, along with my fellow board members, understand the responsibility that has been entrusted upon us to maintain the traditions of your Club and of the wider game.

Everton Football Club was a founder member of the Football League and a founder member of the Premier League.

Throughout our history the Club has always strived to move both Everton and the game forward. But we have always done so within the parameters of the pyramid structure which maintains the principles of open competition and sporting merit.

Sadly, the plans that have been made public by 12 clubs from across Europe - and six in our own Premier League - do not maintain those principles.

At this time of national crisis - in the face of a global pandemic and in a defining period for football - clubs should be working together collaboratively with the thoughts of our game and its supporters uppermost in our minds.

Disenfranchising supporters across the game and undermining the very structure of the pyramid that underpins the game we love is, quite simply, wrong.

The response from voices across the game and beyond over the last 48 hours is understandable – and those voices should be listened to.

Rest assured, I, along with my fellow board members, will do everything possible to ensure our position on these proposals is made in the strongest possible terms - and the voice of Evertonians is heard, loud and clear.

It remains our hope that by working collaboratively, football will find the right answer for its future.”


Use of an upper case C for “Clubs” really does tell you all you need to know. But looking through this, what stands out beyond the greed is the fearfulness and the lack of understanding. Fooball isn’t about winning, it’s about family, friends, identity and love.

Dear Colleagues,

You will be aware of the announcement published late last night regarding Europe’s leading football Clubs coming together to establish a new mid-week competition, the European Super League, governed by its Founding Clubs.

It’s important as a member of our team that I share with you some of the context.

For quite some time now, Clubs, including our own, have held numerous longstanding concerns about not only the future of European football but also the way football is run by UEFA. The global pandemic has also accelerated the instability in the existing European football economic model.

We have therefore joined AC Milan, Arsenal, Atletico Madrid, Chelsea, Barcelona, Inter Milan, Juventus, Manchester City, Manchester United, Real Madrid and Tottenham Hotspur as Founding Clubs of the Super League. It is anticipated that a further three Clubs will join ahead of the inaugural season, which is intended to commence as soon as practicable.

The Super League will be the future of European football and if we want to continue our journey of being a sustainable Club with ambition to grow and continue winning trophies then we should absolutely be part of that process and have a seat at the table rather than outside that group.

The new annual tournament will provide 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. These solidarity payments are expected to be roughly three times what is currently achieved from UEFA competitions. One of the core commitments of the European Super League is to vastly increase financial support for the football pyramid.

After the start of the men’s competition, a corresponding women’s league will also be launched, helping to advance and develop the women’s game.

We know that this announcement has provoked strong feelings within the game and elsewhere but we believe this decision is in the best long-term interests of Liverpool Football Club.

Importantly, this is the beginning of the journey and we can now start an engagement process with you, supporters and key stakeholders to help shape this process in the right way.

There is still much more information to come in due course.

I will keep you updated as we progress on this journey and discuss further on our Town Hall tomorrow.

Thank you for your continued support.

“Not sure I agree with Shearer et al saying this has nothing to do with the players,” writes Alex Ecob. “Football is the players. They are in a hugely influential position to take a stand against this, and vote with their feet about which teams to represent. The possibility of an international ban coming into force may seem to be punishing the wrong people, but a concerted refusal from the players would throw any plans into absolute chaos.”

As per the below, I feel for the players but we are where we are. I also wonder if the ESL clubs are breaching the terms of their contracts with the players, assuming that this can be settled with an uplift in salary. If that’s so – and it’s big if, but not an unlikely one – then if they decide they’re doing well enough already, the clubs have a potentially insurmountable problem.


“A thought on players being banned from international appearances if their club plays in the ESL,” says Phil Gibson. “If a club decides to leave the Premier League and stop being FA-affiliated (or gets chucked out) then those players can’t be considered to be playing Association Football, since that falls solely in the remit of FIFA and its own affiliates. It’s why Rugby Union players don’t get picked for Rugby League international matches, it’s a different sport!

How about the ESL decides, once it controls its own game, that goals scored from a certain distance from the goalline count extra? Or making their own changes to the offside law?”

This is an interesting point, and relates to one we discussed earlier this morning: what if changes are made to the format of the game? If the ESL control the ESL, then they can do whatever they like. And will they have a compliance unit? What if particular results suit the financial imperatives of the cartel?

Gary Neville (@GNev2)

Joel Glazer won’t turn easily!
Jurgen Klopp and the senior players could turn FSG
Man City most likely to crack. This isn’t for them!
The other 3 will follow the lead of others

April 20, 2021

That is nails, well done the Ev.


ferguson freund


Photograph: Darren Staples/REUTERS
Everton is saddened and disappointed to see proposals of a breakaway league pushed forward by six clubs.

Six clubs acting entirely in their own interests.

Six clubs tarnishing the reputation of our league and the game.

Six clubs choosing to disrespect every other club with whom they sit around the Premier League table.

Six clubs taking for granted and even betraying the majority of football supporters across our country and beyond.

At this time of national and international crisis - and a defining period for our game - clubs should be working together collaboratively with the ideals of our game and its supporters uppermost.

Instead, these clubs have been secretly conspiring to break away from a football pyramid that has served them so well.

And in that Pyramid Everton salutes EVERY club, be it Leicester City, Accrington Stanley, Gillingham, Lincoln City, Morecambe, Southend United, Notts County and the rest who have, with their very being, enriched the lives of their supporters throughout the game’s history. And vice versa.

The self-proclaimed Super Six appear intent on disenfranchising supporters across the game - including their own - by putting the very structure that underpins the game we love under threat.

The backlash is understandable and deserved – and has to be listened to.

This preposterous arrogance is not wanted anywhere in football outside of the clubs that have drafted this plan.

On behalf of everyone associated with Everton, we respectfully ask that the proposals are immediately withdrawn and that the private meetings and subversive practises that have brought our beautiful game to possibly its lowest ever position in terms of trust end now.

Finally we would ask the owners, chairmen, and Board members of the six clubs to remember the privileged position they hold – not only as custodians of their clubs but also custodians of the game. The responsibility they carry should be taken seriously.

We urge them all to consider what they wish their legacy to be.

Everton FC Board of Directors

“Lineker is starting down a bad road there,” emails Ruth Purdue. “That’s not a united front. That’s not a hard line we need to take. If these men want to go make money, they can, off they go. (The women is a different issue). They can’t then be called up for international duty which we all pay for and a lot of them already give to charity. They understand, by giving it to charity that they don’t want/need the wage for playing for England. Yes, it is a punishment. That’s the point.”

I feel for the players because who wants this, but if they decide to be a part of the ESL, that might come at a price.

LUFCDATA (@LUFCDATA)

Tremendous post-match quotes from Marcelo Bielsa on the European Super League tonight. 💬 #LUFC pic.twitter.com/xNkKI8HlIN

April 19, 2021

Mike emails in to point out that “Spurs and Arsenal still owe the Bank of England (and thus the taxpayer), a combined £295m through the Covid Corporate Financing Facility (CCFF). One of the terms of this is that they ‘make a material UK contribution”.

Assuming you’re wondering if joining the ESL would constitute a breach of that, presumably the money they trouser could immediately pay that off, or their owners could pay it off, easily, in the knowledge that much more money was coming back to them. But it does highlight, once again, the absolute venality of it all.

Arsenal take out £120m Bank of England loan to ease Covid-19 cashflow worries​

Tottenham take £175m Bank of England loan to ease coronavirus impact​


Alan Shearer has been on BBC Breakfast talking about Jürgen Klopp and sneaking in a glorious Mike Atherton “last evening”.

“He was in a really difficult situation last evening, but he said as much as he could say. He made his feelings clear on the European Super League over a year ago, didn’t he, when he said he didn’t want it. He also said that again last night, he didn’t want it.

“He doesn’t want what his owners want and that is a really powerful voice ... and I’m sure that he will tell his owners what he thinks.

“Where are these owners? Why don’t they come out and face the media and tell us why they’ve done it, why they want a closed shop that no-one else can get into?”

Shearer was also asked about the prospect of players from the clubs involved being banned from playing for their national teams. He said: “That’s deeply unfair. Everyone will come out and look at the legalities - I’m sure that the Premier League will do that, I’m sure that Uefa and Fifa are doing that - and it’s just not fair on the players to be put under this pressure.

“They want to go out and play football, they don’t want to read about the threat of not being able to play for their national team in huge competitions, because that’s what you want to do as a young boy, you want to come up and you want to represent your country.

“For people to be talking about them being barred from doing that when it’s got nothing to do with the players whatsoever, it’s just not right.”


David Beckham has “taken to Instagram” to share his thoughts on “the situation”. There is no relegation in MLS, no, but that’s slightly different to this, in mine, and again, this isn’t the time to be picking at people who are on the right side.

I’m someone who loves football. It has been my life for as long as I can remember. I loved it from when I was a young child as a fan, and I’m still a fan now. As a player and now as an owner I know that our sport is nothing without the fans. We need football to be for everyone. We need football to be fair and we need competitions based on merit. Unless we protect these values the game we love is in danger...
Gary Lineker 💙 (@GaryLineker)

One issue I’m very uncomfortable with is the threats towards players not being allowed to play for their national team. The players have nothing to do with this and should not be punished in this way. These owners don’t care about international football anyway.

April 19, 2021

This is a really tricky one. Players are well paid, but players are still workers, who have a right to go about their professional business. On the other hand, though we’re all obliged as human beings to do the right thing and we’re at a juncture in history where that is now extremely important. The point here isn’t that owners care about players not playing international football per se, it’s that banning players from international football might mean players refuse to play in the ESL, and that might be enough to stop it.


“I think events of the last few days are part of a long-term strategy to deliver a European super league,” reckons Lee Smith. “The current furore means it won’t be next season or for another couple of years, but my fear is that this is founders’ way of creating the discourse that will eventually, say in five years, see the league come to fruition. These are the initial steps to building a rational and an acceptance to the idea, the founders might not win this time but they will be back until they do.”

I think that depends on what the government do. As explained in the last link I posted, if this mess leads to proper reform – a 50+1 ownership model for example – then it’s never happening.


“As a Liverpool fan, I was also hoping for more from Klopp,” says Matt Dony. “But he said something. And something is a start. He’d only had a day or so since he’d learned about the plan, and that day was likely spent preparing for a match. And some of the comments about Neville were obviously misguided, but they were motivated by a desire to protect Liverpool Football Club (in its ‘true’ sense, not in its commercial sense). Hopefully, that protective instinct will serve him well as this whole thing unfolds. Klopp (and Milner) have made a start. It’s not perfect, but it’s better than the silence coming from higher up.”

I’d agree with that. He didn’t do what Thomas Tuchel did, and say he trusted his club’s owners to do the right thing, and he club’s owners aren’t even Roman Abramovich. I worry, though, that he’s blinded by his duty to his club and his players, and misunderstanding how best to protect those things. But all things considered, he made things marginally better than thy were before.


Ultimately, it’s hard to see a way this doesn’t end up making lawyers a lot of money; the question is whether we keep the status quo until things are settled, or the breakaway happens before the legal battles.

The European Super League: what can Boris Johnson do about it?​

UK government may legislate to stop European Super League, says minister​


Patrick Bamford makes a key point: football is not its own world, but part of a society that needs urgent repair.

Benny Bonsu (@MsBennyBonsu)

Also, Patrick Bamford ♥️

‘It’s a shame it’s not like that with racism’... 👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾

pic.twitter.com/2R8pKY5MmP

April 20, 2021
All parties need to work together to improve this industry – it’s ironic that it could not exist without either the players or the fans and yet both these groups are often the last to be consulted on any key decisions.

Louis Saha has written thoroughly, thoughtfully and beautifully about his opposition to the ESL – you can read him here.


“Any word from the clubs’ sponsors yet?” asks Gary Naylor. “They pay a lot of money for the positive vibes their association provides, but there’s not a lot of those about right now. So, what say you Cadbury, Adidas, Nike, Santander, Quorn, Puma, Heineken, Nivea Men, Beats, Hyundai?”

I guess they might decide that they don’t want bad publicity, but thy might also decide that there won’t be a boycott or a boycott that’ll hurt as much as missing out on the ESL’s reach.


“He did criticise the plan,” says Yoaxall of Klopp, “briefly, but everything else he said has completely overshadowed that. It was bizarre and had it been Mourinho he’d have been hauled over the coals. For a man who holds himself out to have socialist principles he let himself down last night. I don’t buy this heat of the moment stuff either. He knew all day he would be asked about it and should have been better prepared. He needs to get out of that mentality and quick, because calling FSG good owners was a bad misstep.”

I’m not going to lie – I was hoping for more. But I think we need to understand that he had a game on which he was focused, and everything else needs filtering through that lens. It’s a start – let’s see what happens next.


“Having watched MNF and considered,” says Victor Rushton, “I think the key lesson, if we are to win, is the importance of everyone presenting a united front and sticking together. Even if we are not sure of everyone’s motives, we need all the help and support we can get. Once we start bickering and trying to out do each other in virtue signalling, defeat is inevitable.”

Yes, I agree with that – politically, a lesson the left is still to learn. Speaking personally, I found Gary Neville’s mea culpa about the Glazers both aggravating and inspiring, having been waiting 16 years for him to say what needed saying. But the reality is that it doesn’t matter at all, because he has reach, anger and a plan, and if this can be stopped, he can be a big part of that and currently, that’s all that matters. And the same applies to Sky and the Premier League, who are part of this - who helped cause this - but who, as far as this goes, are on the right side.


How people are thinking and feeling.

‘Blatantly cynical’: our readers across Europe react to Super League plans​


Here’s David Conn to explain some whys and hows.

Brutal European Super League breakaway snaps limited bonds of solidarity​


“Interested in what grounds you think a government has to tell a football team who it can and cannot play and what you think the ramifications of that are,” emails Paul Roome. “Surely higher up the list should be legislation to prevent UK footballers taking part in the blood-stained 2022 World Cup. A midweek friendly competition should be miles down the list.

The Premier League are the only people who should be sorting this situation out. They could easily do it with a PL salary cap as the ESL doesn’t seem to work without still being in their national competitions.

Why don’t we see if the PL can get their act together before touting/asking Boris Johnson to protect the feelings of fans who are complicit in this anyway (and as has been mentioned elsewhere, were very quiet on the topic of their club helping Haaland’s agent to trouser £30m just as long as it was their team the latest megastar was about to join.

This ESL thing is just a friendly league basically. Honest, who cares (not a single Forest fan I’ve spoken to!). The scarier thing happening is that the wild-cards in the Champions League re-jig mean that whiter-than-white Bayern now have zero chance of ever being eliminated from that competition. Even if they are relegated to division 9 in Germany for misdemeanours(cheating) their ‘EURO COEFFICIENT’ (or whatever they decide to call it) will still plop them safely into the biggest competition in the world. But you’re all ignoring that.”

There are various ways of legislating. Most obviously, a law saying that if you want a licence to operate a football club in this country, then this is what you must do. I guess a ramification might be the clubs taken abroad to become franchises, but at that point they just aren’t those clubs anymore.

I agree the Qatar world cup is appalling. It’s not an either/or situation, for mine.

There’s no time to see what happens. To stop this, the biggest forces need immediate deployment. But I agree on the need for some kind of mechanism, whether that be a cap on salary, squad-size or something else, to make money less important in determining what happens on the pitch.

The ESL would not be a friendly league. Clubs would use their domestic leagues, if they stay in, as they use the Carabao Cup now.

Of course people are entitled to their opinions, but I’m surprised fans of a club who’ve won the European Cup twice want the chance to have another go at it removed forever.

Wanting your club to sign players is not the problem here.

I agree with what you say about the new Champions League, and that needs reforming too, but you need to qualify for European competition to be handed a wild card.


“I don’t understand why Jurgen Klopp is getting so much praise from you,” emails Steven Alcock. “He was unequivocal in his condemnation of Leeds United and Gary Neville, whose words and actions he seems to have completely misinterpreted, whilst refusing to directly criticise his owners or their plans. I know he’s in a difficult position and I’m not having a go at him per se, but I don’t think his interview was particularly laudable either.”

I didn’t give him “so much praise” I don’t think, and the way he went after Neville was wrong and a bit odd, in mine. But ultimately he criticised the plan, as he has in the past, and at this point, it’s a start.


“You’re right, we can save football from this,” emails Thomas Porter. “But the big question is can we save football properly? We need to go further than just stopping the ESL, we need to rebalance football and stop all the money being hoarded at the top, stop all the ridiculous kick off times for TV audiences that fans find it hard to attend etc ... I think this is a tipping point for an outpouring of frustration against all that, but whether we can actually do anything is another question.”

I agree. Stopping the ESL is the first thing, but we need proper governance of the game and for our clubs to be protected as community assets. Speaking personally, some things bother me more or less than others – as a matchgoing fan, I can handle the kick-off time thing, but I can’t abide owners who take money out of clubs or do far worse on a national or global stage, and I’d like checks on spending to protect the competitiveness.

Leeds United (@LUFC)

FULL TIME: #LUFC hold Super League side Merseyside Reds to a 1-1 draw after late Llorente equaliser

April 19, 2021

Thinking back to MNF, the two points that resonated most strongly, I thought were Neville saying six families were stealing football and Carragher saying that place you go to when your team scores would be one you’d never go to again. Marcus Rashford has taught me many things, but near the top of the list is simplicity of messaging. One of the reasons he’s been so successful is that he boiled down the entirety of politics to a single, emotive question: are we happy with children going hungry? If the fight against the ESL is to work, that’s a good lesson to learn, I think.


“Just throwing this out there,” says James Clay. “Uefa already have processes for associations/teams to apply to organise other competitions (mentioned already by footy governance experts – here’s a list of club and national competitions. How about this example, the Baltic League, previously played between clubs from three nations.

Surely, just like a summer tournament, anyone can organise a competition, provided it fulfils certain criteria and gets the nod. The actual friction with the ECL and ESL is the timing of matches and number of matches in different competitions. So, there are precedents for other international competitions (think also pre-season tournaments). Pretty hard to see how the ESL can be stopped. It’s just a matter of when the matches happen.”

I’d say there are two ways it cane be stopped: with government legislation, or with players and managers refusing to take part. I agree with what you say about timing though, and perhaps this’ll be the compromise: a summer club world cup to take place in even-numbered years. In theory this would be incredible for those who follow a team involved, but the problem would be how much money it’d make, thereby distorting competition and allowing them to waste even more before pleading poverty once more.

Liverpool’s Jürgen Klopp and James Milner critical of Super League plans​


“Have you watched American sports?” asks James Beedle “i.e. NBA ‘gametime’ is 48mins, but goes on for 2.5 hours. Bet the ESL will be working on this kind of outlook for that sweet ad revenue.”

Yes, I’d not be at all surprised to see changes to extend things – games chopped into quarters and such.


Florentino Pérez has been talking, so here are the “highlights” of what he said:

“Many important clubs in Spain, Italy and UK want to find a solution to a very bad financial situation. The only way is to play more competitive games. If instead of playing the CL, Super League helps the clubs to recover the lost earnings”. This is one way of looking at things. Another way would be to say these clubs have been horrifically mismanaged, despite a dominant market position and every possible advantage, and can always cut costs.

“Football must evolve like everything in life. Football has to adapt to the times we live in now. Football is losing interest, TV rights are decreasing. We wanted to do the SuperLeague, the pandemic has given us urgency: now we are all ruined in football”. Football is the biggest sport in the world and has a greater, wider reach than anything else. It’s not perfect, but if the pandemic has proved anything it’s how much people love it. This is about protecting revenue for a small cartel of owners, not protecting the game for a planet of obsessives.

“Football needs to change to be more attractive globally. Instead of making the Champions League because it lost interest as he had in 1950, change comes and even at the time FIFA and UEFA were against it. But that’s how football changed...” The European Cup came to be because of the thirst to explore new boundaries, cooperate across borders and find out who the best team is – something to which every club in the world could aspire. The super league would be the antithesis of that, a closed shop created to make money for individuals.

“The attractive thing in football is playing between big clubs, the value for television increases and more income is generated. It’s not just the rich who want the # Super League, we’re doing it to save football because it’s at a critical moment”. The attractive thing in football is identity, community and beauty. Football does need saving, but because of the super league creators (and ilk); they are not saviours.

“It will become like a pyramid because we big clubs will have more money and we will be able to invest it by buying players... if the big clubs lose their money as is happening, the whole football system crashes as with the Champions League”. If there’s one thing we can be sure of, it’s that the super league clubs are interesting in nothing but their bottom lines.

“The Super League is not a closed league, it’s absolutely not true. Whoever wins the five available spots will be able to play with the other best teams in the world”. But the founding clubs are there every season, earning so much money it’s impossible for the rest to compete, and potentially banned from competing against anyone but themselves.

“Players banned from international competitions and National teams according to UEFA? Don’t worry, this will NOT happen. They won’t be banned if they join Super League”. Let’s see.

“Real Madrid, Manchester City and Chelsea as the other clubs of Super League will NOT be banned from the Champions League or domestic leagues. 100%, I’m sure. Impossible”. Let’s see.

“President Ceferin insulted Andrea Agnelli today, it is not possible. It’s crazy to discuss a president of a world club like Juventus. This is something unacceptable, UEFA must change, we don’t want a president who insults other presidents.” But plutocrats with human rights issues are fine.

“Boris Johnson said he will do everything to cancel the Super League because they explained to him that the Premier League would disappear: it’s false, it’s not true. Everything will go back to normal...” Boris Johnson will want to be re-elected, and preventing the Super League will do him no harm in that aspect.

“Real Madrid and other SuperLeague clubs will NOT be excluded from this 2020/2021 Champions League. It won’t happen, the law protects us. This is impossible”. If legislators are so minded, laws can be changed – certainly in a post-Brexit UK.

“The contract of the Super League is binding. Nobody can leave, we will work all together. All the clubs signed the contracts last Saturday, there’s no problem”. Let’s see.

“If we can start the Super League in August, we would do it. We will do our best to start this year. We want to reach an agreement with UEFA and the other parties involved. We will talk with UEFA, FIFA and not only”. Or you want them to agree with your combined exchequers.


On which point:

Oliver Holt (@OllieHolt22)

Hearing the first cracks may be beginning to appear in the ugly, misshapen edifice of the ESL. Told two English clubs are close to losing their nerve.

April 20, 2021

“Good morning, Daniel” tweets @MaliciousA. “32 hours(ish) on, does this seem like it will turn out to be a misstep and rowed back on, or are events too far down the line for the clubs to turn back?”

It’s an interesting question that, because it touches not just on practicalities but on egos. Will your Joel Glazers, your Shekih Mansours and your Roman Abramoviches of this world be prepared to take a public L? And from there flows a further question: how can these people continue to be allowed stewardship of these community assets and public institutions? I’ve no idea, but I’m as certain that this can be rowed back on as I am that it’s not a misstep but a deliberate act.


Today we’ve got the “other” 14 Premier League clubs meeting, we’ve got Boris Johnson meeting the FA and fan groups, and we’ve got Fifa meeting Uefa (I think). Fifa haven’t been that intense in their opposition thus far – let’s see how that plays out.


Now there’s actually the germ of a good idea here, but not for the reasons they think it is. Football isn’t too long, but it’s timekeeping is all wrong; I’d be right behind a change to 30 minutes each way of ball in play time.

Fabrizio Romano (@FabrizioRomano)

Florentino Perez to El Chiringuito: "If young people find football matches too long it may be because they are not interesting enough... or maybe we might have to make the football matches shorter". 🚨

April 19, 2021

Morning all! I don’t know about youse, but I feel slightly better this morning. We’re going to need some leaders and we’re going to need a plan – ultimately, we’re probably going to need legislation too – but it feels like all that is possible. The brilliant performances on Monday Night Football, of Gary Neville and Jamie Carragher in particular but of Jurgen Klopp, Marcelo Bielsa, James Milner and Patrick Bamford too, felt like the start of something – I don’t know about you, but my eyeballs were sweating throughout; they’re sweating now. My days I love our game. It can be saved, and we’re going to save it.


Daniel will be here shortly; until then, why not catch up with all the latest developments and analysis.

Liverpool’s Jürgen Klopp unimpressed by European Super League plans​

Power grab in a pandemic: how absence of fans gave greedy owners their chance | Barney Ronay​

Revealed: unpublished Super League document justifying breakaway​

The ESL would destroy football as we know it – it’s almost as if they don’t care | David Baddiel​

European Super League: government, FA and Uefa unite to denounce plans​


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