So it’s happened and after years of rumours the so-called ‘big’ clubs in Europe have supposedly decided to break away and form their own ‘superleague’ without clubs like Everton and other historic names in their own domestic leagues.
The English clubs joning are the so-called ‘big six’ and don’t include Everton but are the usual suspects who are often bleating on about how hard it is to be the most successful and richest football teams in the world.
So both the Manchester clubs, Arsenal, Chelsea, Tottenham and of course our lovely neighbours across Stanley Park, are all those leaving under these plans.
As an aside, can someone explain to me how Spurs are claimed to be a ‘super-club’ when they’ve only managed to win the English title twice in their entire history and haven’t won an historically major trophy (which doesn’t include the League Cup), since 1991?!
Or Chelsea for that matter who despite their recent success were also historically just a yo-yo club getting promoted and then relegated again until they got bought by a Russian billionare.
But of course we all know membership of this elite is about cash and Premier League profile not your history in the game.
And it’s certainly true that while the Toffees have the cash now, they’ve not been successful for more than 25 years. So although historically the Blues are certainly one of English football’s giants, they aren’t seen as a ‘big club’ today.
This move has provoked a very strong negative reaction from most fans and one I think that has plenty to justify it.
But lets be honest, it’s been on the cards for years and it does reveal once again very clearly that football today is really only about generating even more and more money for a tiny elite, much like society at large.
In a way the curtain has been lifted a little and the naked greed of these clubs and their owners are suddenly seen in the cold light of day.
This process really started when the Premier League broke away from the Football League back in 1992, so in a way we can’t really complain and you could argue this is just a natural, almost inevitable development.
The Premier League breakaway was followed the same year by the evolution of the European Cup into what became the Champions League and the rest as they say is history.
What is different about today’s announcement is that football cannot claim to be the poor relation it thought it was back in the early nineties. At that time the beautiful game was still only just recovering from the twin disasters in the eighties that nearly destroyed it in this country: Heysel and Hillsborough.
The first was the riot that killed nearly fifty Juventus supporters when Liverpool ‘fans’ attacked them before the 1985 European Cup Final in Brussel’s Heysel Stadium. A wall at their end of the stand collapsed and hundreds were crushed in the scramble to escape.
Then four years later in a horrific parallel, just under 100 Liverpool supporters were crushed to death as others tried to get into the ground before the 1989 FA Cup semi-final kicked off at Sheffield Wednesday’s Hillsborough ground.
Both these disasters are intimately linked to Everton too. In 85 the Toffees had just won the league title in rampant style and had also lifted their first European trophy with the Cup-Winners-Cup having been added to that championship.
The Blues of course had a fantastic team and looking forward to the following season, Everton would surely have been favourites to win the European Cup in an era when English clubs were dominating on the continent.
The Heysel riot was the climax of years of hooliganism problems and led eventually to all English clubs being banned from European competition for five years, a ban which particularly hurt Everton who were denied their best chance to claim Europe’s top club prize at last. I can still remember watching the coverage on TV as Jimmy Hill announced the latest example of English hooliganism was unfolding live in Belgium.
In the end the Toffees never really got over the European ban and although another championship was won again in 1987, it ultimately led to a string of players like Gary Lineker, Trevor Steven, Gary Stevens and manager Howard Kendall leaving the club over the next few years.
Then came Hillsborough. Everton were playing in the other FA Cup semi-final that Saturday and I came home on a high as the Blues had got though to Wembley only to hear of the disaster. It hit Blues fans as many had friends or family connected to it and the whole of Merseyside felt the impact of those deaths.
Anyway, after all that football was very much in the doldrums as the 1990’s began and the Premier League breakaway was the outcome as the First Division clubs sought to try and revive the popularity and income of the game by linkeing up with the new satelite tv station BskyB.
And it worked as the new league went on to become the most profitable football league in the world. In addition the ‘Champions’ League (although you didn’t have to win your league anymore to qualify), is now worth millions more and the biggest names in European football have grown immensely rich from it.
So why do these clubs need to create a European League when they effectively already have one? UEFA has been trying to forstall this from happening by caving into demands from the big names to change the compeition and ensure virtually guarateed access regardless of whether they had finished in one of the now many qualifying places avaialble.
The new even more bloated format would have given certain select clubs a backdoor into the Champions League using a formula based on recent past appearances.
But even though the football authorities are bending over backwards to apease these clubs it hasn’t apparently worked and they have decided to go their own way. Given all this, it’s rich to hear UEFA claiming they are now concerned for the integrity of the game!
I think there’s another reason why this is happening now and that’s the impact of the last year. The previous twelve months and the reaction to Covid 19 has radically changed life and football, possibly forever. Most of the top European clubs have taken a huge hit from this and so they are desperate for a new way to make more money from their still very poular product.
However, I think the football authorities in each European country should take tough action as all clubs have suffered in this situation, not just the elite ones and a closed euro league for the few would have huge negative impact on grassroots football.
More from Prince Rupert's Tower
- Everton 0 Arsenal 1: Blues fall to third home defeat
- Further chaos in Everton takeover as other lenders not keen on 777 Partners
- Everton need repeat of Arsenal win to kick-start their season on Sunday
- More madness at Everton as Moshiri now agrees to sell club to 777 Partners
- Everton takeover talk cools after UK govt doubts and further questions
So ban all these clubs immediately from their respective domestic leagues and here the FA should also prevent Chelsea playing in the FA Cup final they’ve just reached. After all if they have so little respect for their own country’s game why should they enjoy it’s rewards?
What would happen then is that the Premier League would now have Leciester City top, West Ham second and Everton third, presumably in a Champions League place. And in the FA Cup the best Premier League team in the quarter-finals or beyond apart from Chelsea and City should have Chelsea’s place in the final.. oh wait that means Everton!
Seriously though what does all this potential chaos mean for the Toffees? Well it’s obvious the Blues aren’t going to be invited to join the new select few and it would have been interesting to see what Farhad Moshiri and co would have done if the club were in that group..?
UEFA and the Premier League are talking of legal challenges but I assume these clubs have done their homework before going ahead and so I’d be surprised if there is an obvious loophole there.
Assuming the super league or whatever it’s called goes ahead, it will obviously radically change English football and there are two ways to see this.
On the one hand the truth is losing these clubs will massively devalue the Premier League and Champions League because as we all know these clubs are the big draw in both tournaments. So financially and in terms of player recruitment, it will presumably have a huge impact.
However, it will open up these competitions and certainly provide Everton with much more chance of winning the traditional big prizes again! We will see how all this unfolds but there’s no doubt this crisis is certainly going to alter football whatever ultimately comes of it.