UEFA - Champions League and European Super League Marketing

The 2021/22 Champions League season has been the first where the ‘away goals’ rule has been scrapped, it was initially not welcomed by large amounts of football fans when Arsene Wenger originally proposed the idea, however, if you ask people who have been watching this year’s tournament, you would be hard-pressed to find someone who thinks that this has hurt the quality of the tournament.

(This year's UCL star; Karim Benzema)

This could well reignite the spark surrounding controversy from last year's proposed UEFA Super League, which was a proposed seasonal club competition that initially would have been contested by twenty European football clubs, all the top clubs in Europe were set to be involved, except German football clubs Bayern Munich, Borussia Dortmund etc., as they did not agree with the ethical implications of the tournament.

Essentially the twelve ‘founder clubs’ would be guaranteed a spot in the competition (to replace the UEFA Champions League) every year, disregarding the sporting merit usually needed to qualify for European competition through performance in their respective domestic leagues. This was the main issue that the footballing world had with this idea, as they believed that this would cause the end of certain clubs at the bottom of the football pyramid and that football was slowly losing its soul, for the benefit of those at the top making even more money.

The worldwide disgust went viral as the topic was trending on all social media sites on the same day, it was the topic in the build-up on tv for every major broadcaster and caused fan outrage globally. Even with COVID restrictions in place, Chelsea fans took to the streets outside Stamford Bridge to protest the idea, and Petr Cech had to talk to fans to calm them down. More dramatically, a group of hardcore Manchester United fans stormed Old Trafford to enter the pitch before their behind-closed-doors match against Liverpool, in a protest of the Glazer ownership of the club, with their anger being reignited by their attempts at helping found the Super League – this protest resulted in the game being called off, and the combined outrage globally ended up causing the Super League to be stopped.

Shortly after, UEFA released their new ‘Swiss-Model’ Champions League format, which will involve every team playing in a single league at the group stage, with a guarantee of at least 10 games. There will also be 36 teams in the competition, four more than now. Also, some slots are set to be given to clubs based on ‘historical performance’, again disrupting the integrity of sporting merit.

It could be argued that UEFA has been clever about this, as they are certain that change will be made, and know that the Super League will prevail, so have put forward a worse alternative so that fans will accept the initial proposal instead. This is a great marketing play from UEFA if this is the case, as it will soften the blow to disgusted fans as it is the better option for football and created much more support for the Super League.

The Super League had the motto ‘The best clubs. The best players. Every week.’ And it was simply not enough for fans to buy into the idea. Because from an outsider's view, watching the top sides of Europe battle it out every week, the entertainment spectacle would be much higher than the current Champions League format. However, the core football fans sometimes love the underdog stories of the Champions League, like when Moldovan side FC Sherriff beat Real Madrid at the Santiago Bernabeu in this year’s group stage, in their first-ever year in the competition. This was a prime example of the entertainment factor that the Champions League can create, as some fans adopt the mindset of ‘if it's not broke, don’t fix it.

On the other hand, the founders of the Super League have since proposed a new idea, including promotions and relegations and lots more opportunities to qualify for this league, and fewer matches being played in the competition. While these new changes are better than the initial proposal, it is still not sitting right for most football fans.

The end goal of the Super League has been rumoured to take the competition global, like Formula 1, whereby each match day/week the teams will face off in several different continents to increase eyes to the competition and sport and also increase the revenue involved. This would be great for marketing football to develop the sporting product globally, as currently nearly all of the sports commercial and on-the-pitch success is played in Europe. If Asian, American, and African clubs were involved in the super league, then the fiscal increase would be off the scale.

Do you think that the Super League will come to fruition? And should it?