The richest clubs and biggest leagues in Europe "are set to tighten their grip on the Champions League's future format and prize money this week," according to Graham Dunbar of the AP. A deal being prepared by UEFA "should end threats by some elite clubs to break away and form a closed European Super League before 2021." However, "it could ensure that more guaranteed places in the 32-team group stage and bigger shares of billion-dollar prize money each season will go to teams like Real Madrid, Barcelona and Juventus from the four highest-ranked national leagues." In the hours before the group-stage draw on Thursday, "a series of meetings with clubs and UEFA executive committee members in Monaco is expected to agree changes to entry slots for the 2018-2021 seasons." UEFA and the European Club Association "declined to comment on reports that the top leagues -- in Spain, Germany, England and Italy -- will each get four direct entries into the groups." Italian clubs "are looking to be the big winner." Serie A "would offer four direct entries to the group stage, compared to two in the current three-season commercial cycle which expires in 2018." Spain, England and Germany "would also benefit by ending the risk of its fourth-placed club losing in the playoff round each August." Advancing through the playoffs is worth tens of millions of euros as UEFA will share €1.3B ($1.47B) "among the 32 group-stage clubs this season" (AP, 8/23).
'OUT OF THE QUESTION': The BBC's Richard Conway wrote a leading presidential candidate for UEFA said that a move to form a breakaway super league involving Europe's top sides would lead to "war" between the clubs and UEFA. Slovenian FA President Aleksander Ceferin, who holds more than 20 pledges of support for his presidential candidacy, insists any closed super league is "out of the question." Sports companies in the U.S. and China "have proposed a breakaway league but Ceferin insists European football will remain united." He said, "One of the main issues awaiting the next UEFA president is relations to the big clubs. My firm opinion is that some kind of closed super league with just a few clubs in, without the possibility for the others to enter, is out of the question. It will mean a kind of war between UEFA and the clubs. If they want more revenues we should work on it. It is possible" (BBC, 8/24).
