The president of La Liga, Javier Tebas, has warned that football cannot afford to overlook the threat posed by A22, whose latest proposal for a European Super League was unveiled in December.
Uefa is considering how to respond after A22 launched plans for a Unify League, which follows two previous failed concepts. One option is to authorise the plan and let clubs decide whether to jump ship from the Champions League and other existing continental tournaments. There is little evidence A22 could spark a meaningful breakaway despite holding talks with a number of clubs, but Tebas is concerned that a lack of understanding may help an “elitist” idea gain traction.
“It’s not a serious project at all,” he told the Guardian. “What they’re looking for is to generate instability and uncertainty in European football. We have to pay attention to them because the day-to-day life at a club absorbs you so much that you don’t have time to analyse these kinds of approach in great depth. The leagues should really speak out about this problem.
“They’re trying to mislead European football so we have to explain that it’s not a serious project. If we didn’t, some of the clubs could believe it. People shouldn’t just think about the format: the sporting model is elitist and oligarchic.”
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Tebas repeated previous claims that his arch-rival Florentino Pérez, the Real Madrid president who was a key figure in devising plans for the original Super League in 2021 and has clung on to the prospect ever since, is pulling the strings behind A22’s most recent scheme. The new model proposes four divisions and a total of 96 clubs in its men’s division, with no promotion or relegation. Access would be based on annual performance in domestic leagues. Its financial feasibility is unclear.
Uefa has blocked previous super league iterations but had to change its rules for authorising new competitions before a European court of justice ruling in December 2022 that found their previous regulations were contrary to EU law. A22 believes Uefa will have to authorise its plan in principle.
“I’m sure they are trying to pressurise Uefa to make some sort of agreement,” Tebas said. “But Uefa should pay no attention because football will not support this project. They need to ask for clarifications of what’s been presented: how does your economic model work and what about the governance? And if they can do that, they should start a consultation process with all the other stakeholders in European football. I know A22 have had interviews with some clubs, talked about it and explained it, but nobody has made that step forward. What they want to do is blackmail Uefa.”
Tebas also took fresh aim at the expanded Club World Cup. In October, he had asked the Fifa president, Gianni Infantino, to scrap the competition and, in a connected development, he was involved in lodging a complaint to the European Commission from Fifpro and the European Leagues against Fifa’s imposition of the sport’s match calendar.
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“We’ll continue to work so that there aren’t Club World Cups, but we’ll have to see,” he said. “I think financially it will be a disaster, but the unions and leagues don’t want the sporting model either. It affects all leagues’ calendars. The project hasn’t thought about the ripple effects on the rest of football. These new competitions and formats are created without even thinking that the real football industry is in the domestic leagues.”
Tebas claimed Fifa has offered no response to the complaint regarding the calendar and refused to rule out the prospect of a future players’ strike. “At some moment in time I think things may go overboard,” he said. “Fifa aren’t aware that there comes a point when people get fed up, and then you can’t control a situation. This will happen at some point.”
La Liga has a close business relationship with Saudi Arabia and, asked whether he endorsed the deeply controversial 2034 World Cup, Tebas responded glowingly. “I’m sure it will be the most spectacular and best World Cup we’ve ever seen,” he said.
