It was clear that the appearance of the new super league will change things in European football. We have learned in the press how not to do it. Now let's examine what the best way to go about it is.With an interesting take on how to relaunch the annual cup tournaments of the top clubs from all the countries' leagues!

In April 2021 twelve of the biggest richest, most well-known clubs who play in the leagues of England, Spain and Italy made a joint announcement that they had come together to form a break-away league. There was a lot of sound business intel behind this. Much thought had gone into it. They planned to set up the greatest league of any sport in the world by combining some of the biggest players in the biggest game there is. Their idea was not all bad. It lacked a few crucial elements and it received a massive back-lash of irate fans, especially after the national football associations of the three countries and UEFA began to say that these clubs and all players who play for them will be banned from taking part in any of the cups that these governing bodies stage. This total war-footing confrontational response was the result of UEFA and the national football associations calculating that they will lose out big time from this chance, with their major competitions under the threat of suddenly becoming minor happenings in the backwater. This threat was also including the loss of control over what happened next and over what rule changes the super league teams allow themselves to make as they no longer come under any of the main national or international rule-setting and rule-enforcement jurisdictions once they are playing in the breakaway super league. Much like when rugby split up to become two sports, football was fast heading in the same fateful direction.As events rapidly unfolded during the course of April (when this was written) and May 2021, the super league idea quickly ran out of steam and died a horrible death, under emotionally charged hostile fire from all sides. This was to be expected in a world where people guard their passions and their long-established systems of opponent allocation and of play timetabling with a deep and thorough grip of all-pervasive hatred of nearly all change, even while not thinking this of itself.There were some very bad elements of the super league idea of April 2021, such as the founders' right to forever avoid relegation, the failure to bring the national governing bodies, UEFA or fans aboard, the failure to appeal to Bayern Munich or Paris Saint Germain, and the way the message was dropped, going from secret to announcement overnight, without a public debate on the matter and hence people were left feeling like someone evil was pulling what they have at the moment forcefully out of their hands. It was perceived as a owners' decision, as if 12 car owners had decided to repaint their cars or something. Of course the owners may do such a thing, well they can in the three countries it affected most, but should it have gone ahead in this form? No. Differently. It will certainly not be the last time we see something like this happening in the world of football. And we, the authors of this book, wish to come out openly and say: We think the super league idea could work, would work, and would bring with it more improvements than negative changes to the football world we live in. One form of positive change, if it were done properly, in the manner we will explain shortly, would come through a significant growth in the global appeal of the battle for the number one spot in European clubs football, a sport that already has massive appeal way beyond its participating country already now. A second positive would be a reduction in the ability gap between the top and the bottom end of the national leagues, which needs to happen with or without the super league, most definitely, unless we want to end up in a world where the outcome of all matches is 99.9% known in advance. How horrible would that be! Another gain would be the fact that other clubs would win massive prizes that come with winning big league and cup competitions, not just the top 15 clubs who currently dominate everything with increasing gaps emerging between them and the rest, a development we need to reverse.

The controversy around the breakaway European Super League, set to conquer the UEFA Champions League, and the surrounding antitrust proceedings revive the academic discussion about the monopoly power of sport-internal governing bodies (like the UEFA), the justification for and limits of their powers, and potential abuses of their power. Against this background, we discuss how much monopoly is unavoidable in premier-level European football and how its powers can be limited and, thus, scope and incentives for power abuse may be reduced. We particularly find that championship management can be periodically assigned to third-parties (like the Super League organizers) by tender procedures, thus, creating a periodical competition for the market, fueling innovation incentives and strengthening the influence of fans' preferences.

Master's Thesis from the year 2009 in the subject Law - Civil / Private / Trade / Anti Trust Law / Business Law, grade: gut, Tilburg University (Faculty of Law), course: International Business Law, language: English, abstract: The ENIC judgement of the Court of Arbitration for Sports clarified in 1999 that the UEFA regulations on multi-club ownership are necessary to maintain the integrity of football, in particular, the authenticity of results. Under the UEFA regulations, controlling interests in more than one club participating in a UEFA club competition are prohibited. However, it is not only multi-club ownership that may influence the so-called integrity of the game. Investments of clubs in other clubs (cross ownership) and shareholdings of "club-involved" persons in a club different from their own also raise issues. The following paper therefore examines the current regulations on those shareholdings for UEFA competitions (Champions' League and Europa League) and for national leagues in England, Spain, and Germany. The analysis provides a detailed overview of how the game's integrity is protected and shows whether improvements seem necessary.

We know how not to do it - now find out how the structure around the new Super League of European Football would ideally be structured, managed and arranged

This textbook provides a comprehensive overview of the ways in which the law has impacted on how sport is played, administered and consumed. The author writes in a clear and engaging manner, tracing the origins and sources of this rapidly evolving subject and drawing examples from a wide range of professional and amateur sports to illustrate the important current debates and topics of interest. The book covers a wide-range of topics from participant and non-participant liability, fighting sports and their legality, and liability for stadium safety and disasters. The final section of the book takes in the very latest developments in mass-event sport and the growing but fundamental area of sports commercialisation. New to this Edition: - Fully updated and includes analyses of the Pechstein and Sharapova decisions - Includes details on the state aid rulings on financial support for Spanish and Dutch football clubs - The author includes a review of the Rio 2016 Olympics

This book is the first to explore and compare football governance, fandom culture and supporter engagement in Europe. With a specific focus on supporter activism and campaigning, the collection provides a comparative study of several European countries. The authors argue that supporters, despite being the pillar or the ‘lifeblood’ of their club, see their role in football governance marginalised. The volume is unique in that it challenges the widely accepted assumption that membership football clubs encourage the democratic participation of supporters. Covering football fandom in both the traditional ‘big five’ leagues and non-‘big five’ countries such as Portugal, Turkey, Croatia, Poland and Czech Republic, the volume will be of interest to students and scholars across a range of disciplines, including sociology, history, sport management, sport governance and political science.

The book examines the transformation of European football in recent years by focusing on the impact of Europe in general and the EU in particular on the way that the game has evolved in a broad cross section of European states. The book brings together two significant research agendas: first, that on the governance of sport in Europe/the European Union; secondly, that within European integration studies on "Europeanization" (most commonly understood at the process of change in the domestic arena resulting from European integration). The concept of Europeanization and in particular top down Europeanization is used to shape the individual country case studies. Other transformational factors such as globalization are also assessed.The three chapters in the introductory section set the context within which the transformation of European football has occurred with particular emphasis on the role of UEFA and EU institutions. The ten country studies in the central part of the book include the five leading football nations in Europe and smaller countries that are facing new challenges in the competitive environment of modern European football. They include an example of a country that is a recent accession state and one outside the EU. What emerges from these chapters is both the shaping influence of Europeanization but also the extent to which it is countered and modified by national culture and structures. What is also noticeable the sense of decline among some of the small and even larger footballing nations in the continent.This book will be of interest to students of European politics, sports governance and football, it also represents a substantial contribution to the debate on Europeanization.

This book tackles issues of globalization in the English Premier League and unpicks what this means to fan groups around the world, drawing upon a range of sociological theories to tell the story of the local and global repertoires of action emanating from the popular protests at Liverpool and Manchester United football clubs.

Additional written evidence is contained in Volume 3, available on the Committee website at www.parliament.uk/cmscom