Ceferin dismisses “super league” plans as fiction

UEFA president Aleksander Ceferin insists a European “super league” will never come to fruition amid reports of a proposed breakaway.

A recent Football Leaks document, reported in Der Spiegel, claimed a host of European football’s top clubs were in advanced negotiations to create a new league.

The German publication alleged that Bayern Munich and the club’s chairman Karl-Heinz Rummenigge were at the forefront of the plans, with Manchester United, Manchester City, Chelsea, Arsenal, Liverpool, Real Madrid, Barcelona and Juventus among the 11 clubs they were purportedly hoping to persuade to join a new competition.

Both the club and Rummenigge issued strenuous denials, with the latter saying he is considering taking legal action.

Ceferin has now had his say and stated in no uncertain terms that such an idea will never see the light of day.

“We have some ideas. All I can say is that any super league is out of the question. It will not happen. It is in a way a fiction now or a dream,” he said.

European Club Association chairman Andrea Agnelli, also the chairman of Juve, says the plan is to work with UEFA.

“I can confirm we have never seen, never discussed, never been involved in the creation of this document.

“We are fully engaged with UEFA in shaping the game going forward.”

A third European club competition with 32 teams is likely to be confirmed at a UEFA meeting next month, and Agnelli believes it will herald wider European competition that the clubs and national associations support.

“It will be our duty to safeguard the great heritages of European football but, on the other side, I think we are very well aware that we have to safeguard markets, we have to think about upcoming markets,” Agnelli said.

“We have to think about Poland. We have to think about Turkey, we have to think about Russia. Fans can rest assured that if we put our hands into making a new product it’s because we want to make sure fans across Europe engage.”