UEFA president Aleksander Ceferin has warned the four sides yet to formally withdraw from the Super League that they must do so soon or face bans from the Champions League and Europa League.
While eight of the teams have distanced themselves from the rebel competition, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Juventus and AC Milan have continued to support the Super League and remain keen to find a solution.
Ceferin is also looking for a quick solution, but to the UEFA president, it’s a simple issue: Teams cannot have their cake and eat it too.
“It’s crystal clear that the clubs will have to decide if they are Super League or they are a European club,” Ceferin told AP. “If they say ‘we are a Super League’, then they don’t play Champions League, of course…and if they are ready to do that, they can play in their own competition.
“We still are waiting for legal expertise and then we will say, but everybody faces consequences for their decisions and they know that. For me, it’s a very different situation between the clubs that admitted their mistake and said, ‘We will leave the project.’ The others mainly know I would say that this project is dead, but they don’t want to believe it, probably.”
Of the quartet, Real are the only side who remain in European competition this year. They are scheduled to face Chelsea in the Champions League quarter-final, but despite suggestions they could be expelled from the competition, Ceferin recently confessed Real are almost certain to be allowed to remain.
The 2020/21 semi-finals are set ✅
??? Who will reach the final in Istanbul❓#UCL pic.twitter.com/W7KUOm1uah
— UEFA Champions League (@ChampionsLeague) April 14, 2021
“We agreed today at the executive committee to connect with the football federations, the national associations and leagues that are concerned,” Ceferin continued. “We will do that next week and we’ll see. It would be good that we can see what specific leagues can do, and what the federations can do, and what UEFA can do.”
The president’s latest words come almost a week after the Super League plans first came to light, and Ceferin recalled just how he realised the football landscape was about to be shaken up.
It was all the time somewhere in the air, not exactly that it will happen, but that something is going on,” Ceferin said. “But I still thought that people cannot lie so much, because if they would want to do it, they would not do the ECA meeting on Friday…but the way they did it was the worst possible.
“The worst day was Saturday, because then I realised that it was a pure betrayal, that some people lied to us for years. It was quite strange because I didn’t know what exactly will happen the next day. It was like something will be announced; nobody knows what.
“Then I got a phone call from three or four clubs saying, ‘We are terribly sorry, but we have to say otherwise we are out’. But then on Sunday when I woke up, I was sure, I was very confident to face this and solve this.”
