Liverpool FC Forum

by **Reg** » Wed Mar 18, 2009 6:00 pm

Wednesday, 18th March 2009

No plans for Euro super league
Reuters

European soccer's governing body UEFA and the continent's top clubs have no plans to create a "Super League" to replace the Champions League and UEFA Cup, officials said yesterday.

UEFA officials told Reuters a European Super League is a "non-starter" for their president Michel Platini, playing down media reports it was mulling plans for such a competition.

Platini was quoted by France Football as saying UEFA was prepared to discuss plans from European teams to create a continental league to replace the Champions League and UEFA Cup.

Italy's Gazzetta dello Sport said the project also had some backing from within UEFA.

"People should not mix up the philosophy and reality. As far as the president (Platini) is concerned such a proposal (super league) is a non-starter," a senior official close to Platini told Reuters.

"He (Platini) is always open to dialogue and to look at ways of adapting and improving UEFA competitions in line with the times. But he has his own philosophy and beliefs about the game and one such belief is that he is dead set against a super league."

France Football quoted Platini as saying: "Everybody knows my philosophy about European competitions... but the world is changing and we must be careful about that."

"If it was up to me, I would revert to European Cups as they were at the beginning, with just knockout rounds. But we must listen carefully to any suggestion. If clubs come and talk to us, we would listen to them and then decide."

The French publication also said the ECA talked about a "Super League" during a meeting last week in Nyon, Switzerland.

But a spokesman for the European Club Association said the organisation - representing 137 clubs such as Manchester United, Real Madrid and Milan - "is very happy with the existing European competitions".

"ECA regrets these unfounded rumours which can only damage the harmony in the European football family," he said after the ECA executive discussed the media reports at a meeting in Amsterdam yesterday.

"We have never had any intention of implementing such a competition. We have never discussed it and it has never been on our agenda."

The Super League would be made up of three divisions with 20 to 22 clubs in each tier, the two newspapers said.

Domestic leagues would remain if a Super League ever got the go-ahead, Gazzetta said, but matches would have to be reduced.

by **JoeTerp** » Wed Mar 18, 2009 8:14 pm

Sounds Similar to how Football is played in Brazil

by **tubby** » Wed Mar 18, 2009 10:50 pm

Would be very expensive for fans to follow teams around Europe.

by **JoeTerp** » Thu Mar 19, 2009 4:29 am

UEFA is already willing to ask teams to travel to a possible 10 away matches in the Champions League. One way that it could be possible:

Every country runs their domestic league campaign from August till the end of December. This would obviously call for either a lesser amount of teams in the top flight or a non double round robin schedule. Imagine a 14 team premier league with out a league cup, no european midweek games, and a week or so earlier start.

Then after a short break in January, starting the European league system which again could be run as either a 12 to 14 team league or a 24-32 team super league divided into divisions and then having the division winners compete in a super division for the European Crown. There would be something like 3 tiers of this Europa A, Europa B, Europa C, and then a big ole Europa Cup competition for the highest ranked qualifiers from each country that weren't already in Europe. This big ole Cup's semi finalists would all earn promotion into next season's Europa C, and the bottom four Europa C teams would earn slots in the next season's Europa Cup. There would probably also be grounds for bringing back the Cup Winners Cup, which would bring more importance to teams domestic cups and would be the determinate of Europe's best "Cup Team"

by **Reg** » Thu Mar 19, 2009 8:27 pm

bavlondon wrote:Would be very expensive for fans to follow teams around Europe.

Most european fans n Italy and Spain for example only go to home games anyway.

I went to a Barça - Real Madrid game and the RM away fans were less than 500.

by **tubby** » Sat Mar 21, 2009 4:54 pm

Im lucky ive actually been to quite a few European away games. But I could not afford to go around Europe all year like that.

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