Europe’s top clubs have had a draft report leaked which contains details of plans to try and ensure that the 18 clubs which comprise G14 are ensured entry into the Champion’s League every season, effectively creating an artifical European Superleague.

While G14 general manager Thomas Kurth denies that the group plans to ring fence the Champion’s League in any way it is impossible to view their controversial plans as anything other than an attempt by the richest clubs to secure their own interests at the expense of traditional democratic qualification methods and cup structures.

UEFA have reacted angrily to the leaked report claiming that it would make football as predictable as professional wrestling but in this day and age of the same teams qualifying virtually every season for the Champion’s League and then reinforcing their position with the money they earn by qualifying, it has become somewhat of a closed shop anyway.

UEFA are obviously worried that the G14 will attempt to usurp some of their power and control over the game but by conceding ground to them since the inception of the Champion’s League and pandering to the wishes and financial greed of the richest clubs they have made a rod for their own back while at the same time managing to devalue virtually every cup and league competition in Europe.

The race for more and more money at the expense of the ideals of sporting play and the love of football have tarnished what should have been a golden age for European football but has instead turned into a grubby, murky world of money chasing and lessened values amongst clubs, players and fans.

Maybe a permanent European Superleague between the 18 members of G14 would take this high end, materilaistic value out of the game and while the rich compete to get richer in their own private league, they could let the rest of football try to reclaim the values and level of competition it once held before the money became the prize and not the trophy.

This entry was posted on Saturday, March 18th, 2006 at 3:08 pm and is filed under Finances In Football, General Football Articles. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments. Both comments and pings are currently closed.