The European Super League (ESL) could contain as many as 60 to 80 teams within a multidivisional format, A22 Sports Management‘s Chief Executive, Bernd Reichart, has reported.
A22 Sports Management is the group currently pushing for a revamped European league, which would be based purely on sporting performance and with no permanent members.
The company originally backed the 12-club ESL proposal in 2021 which received widespread backlash. Consequently, English participants Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool, Manchester City, Manchester United and Tottenham Hotspur backed out of the project within 48 hours.
Under the new idea, teams would still be guaranteed at least 14 matches per season. This, Reichart explained, would provide ‘stability and predictability’ of revenue.
Reichart explained to German newspaper Die Welt: “The foundations of European football are in danger of collapsing. It’s time for a change. It is the clubs that bear the entrepreneurial risk in football.
“But when important decisions are at stake, they are too often forced to sit idly by on the sidelines as the sporting and financial foundations crumble around them.”
A22 has consulted with around 50 European clubs since October 2022, developing 10 principles which highlight its plans for a new-look league.
LaLiga President, Javier Tebas, wrote on twitter alongside an illustration: “The Super League is the wolf, who today disguises himself as a granny to try to fool European football.
“But HIS nose and HIS teeth are very big, four divisions in Europe? Of course the first for them, as in the 2019 reform. Governed by the clubs? Of course only the big ones.”
