UEFA president Aleksander Ceferin has accused club owners trying to resurrect a European Super League of ‘living in a parallel world’ and took aim at Juventus chief Andrea Agnelli, APA reports citing Daily Mail.
Plans for a breakaway competition involving a dozen prominent clubs from England, Spain and Italy folded amid a furious backlash from fans, national associations and UEFA last year.
However, reports suggest that Barcelona, Real Madrid and Juventus are plotting to relaunch the idea imminently in another direct challenge to UEFA and its Champions League.
He was speaking at the Financial Times Business of Football Summit in London, where Juventus chairman Agnelli, who resigned as chairman of the European Club Association [ECA] to start the Super League, is due to speak later and watched Ceferin speak from the front row.
Ceferin said: ‘I have to say that those speaking about the Super League are not speaking about football. I am sick and tired of this non-football project.
‘First, they launched their nonsense of the idea in the middle of a pandemic. Now, we read articles that they are planning to launch another idea now in the middle of a war.
‘Do I have to speak more about these people? They obviously live in a parallel world.
‘We are helping in a terrible situation, they are working on a project like that. They can pay whoever they want to write "this is a nice project, they are full of solidarity, there will be charity to small ones."
‘This is nonsense and everyone knows it. One of them, after it, called me and apologised - but then they go again. For them, the fans are customers. For us, the fans are fans.’
Addressing Agnelli directly, Ceferin added: ‘They criticised UEFA and the ECA, one of them was chairman of the ECA.
‘I have quotes from where he was praising the system a week before they launched the Super League.’
And in a final warning to the three clubs seeking to revive the Super League, the UEFA chief said: ‘They can play their own competition, nobody forbids them. But if they play their own competition, they can’t play in our competition.’
Ceferin also denied that the reforms to the Champions League under the expanded group stage ‘Swiss Model’ are not a surrogate for a Super League.
‘For anyone to compare the reform of the Champions League with the Super League is not serious,’ he said.
‘We have 32 teams in the Champions League now, the plan is to have 36 with more places for smaller and mid-placed leagues.’
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