The Rise and Fall of the European Super League

The Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) oversees football in Europe. (UEFA Store)

Twelve of Europe’s elite soccer clubs announced the formation of a European Super League (ESL) on April 18. The twelve clubs, including six from England, proposed a league of 15 ‘founding clubs’ with a further five spots allocated to European leagues deemed worthy. 

The twelve clubs could not find an additional three members to join their proposal. The teams involved included Manchester United, Manchester City, Chelsea, Arsenal, Tottenham Hotspurs, Liverpool, Barcelona, Atletico Madrid, Real Madrid, Juventus, Inter Milan, and AC Milan. 

The league broke away from UEFA’s Champions League, which serves as the pinnacle of European soccer. Membership to this league allows for much more inclusivity than the proposed ESL, as any team can qualify if they perform well enough in their respective domestic leagues. In comparison, the ESL guaranteed the founding clubs places every season without much guidance on how other teams could join.

In their announcing statement, the first Chairman of the ESL and Real Madrid President Florentino Perez said, “We will help football at every level and take it to its rightful place in the world. Football is the only global sport in the world with more than four billion fans, and our responsibility as big clubs is to respond to their desires.” 

Chairman of Juventus and Vice-Chairman of the ESL Andrea Agnelli contributed to this statement, saying, “Our 12 Founder clubs represent billions of fans across the globe and 99 European trophies. We have come together at this critical moment, enabling European competition to be transformed, putting the game we love on a sustainable footing for the long-term future, substantially increasing solidarity, and giving fans and amateur players a regular flow of headline fixtures that will feed their passion for the game while providing them with engaging role models.”

The announcement of the ESL prompted soccer fans and organizations around the world to vehemently retaliate, mainly due to allegations of greed underpinning the league’s creation. Ex-Manchester United player Ander Herrera criticized the league, calling it “the rich stealing what the people created.” Even U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson expressed his “unwavering support” for fans speaking out against the ESL.

Soccer governing bodies such as UEFA and FIFA viewed the league as an existential threat. In a joint statement made by UEFA, the Premier League, the English Football Association, La Liga, and Serie A, they described the formation of a Super League as a “cynical project founded on the self-interest of a few clubs.” In a separate statement condemning the league, UEFA declared, “The clubs concerned will be banned from playing in any other competition at domestic, European or world level and their players could be denied the opportunity to represent their national teams.”

The lack of any German teams within the league surprised few people. Not only did they not receive an invitation to join, but they have more financial responsibility than those in the ESL. Take Bayern Munich for example, the largest and most successful club in Germany with worldwide acclaim. They do not, unlike the Spanish clubs, have great debts. Furthermore, German clubs have a mandatory “50% + 1” rule, where club members own 50 percent plus one share of the club. This allows club members to vote for board members and the club president. “[Joining the ESL] would have [had] consequences. Heads would have rolled. We could have called an extraordinary general meeting and voted out Herbert Hainer [the current club president]. And if there were fans in the stadium, it would have kicked off,” explains Alex Fischer of Club Nr. 12, an umbrella organization representing match-going Bayern Munich supporters.

After 48 hours of fallout, many clubs left the ESL. On Tuesday evening, all six Premier League clubs announced their withdrawal from the ESL. The long-term effects of the ESL have started to take shape, with UEFA President Aleksander Ceferin emphasizing that all 12 clubs will face punishment. “Everyone has to take consequences for what they did and we cannot pretend nothing happened.”

With the ESL dead in the water, the ongoing effects of the proposition will play out over the next few months. Perhaps the silver lining to the episode has been the fan response. Fans placed banners at stadiums and protested holding placards. This emphasized the notion that soccer is for the fans, regardless of corporate interests.