Barcelona broke their silence over the European Super League on Thursday and, despite almost of all of its original members having already deserted the project, declared itself fully onboard.
The view contrasted starkly with Gerard Pique’s. In a television interview he said in the long term a Super League could bring about the disappearance of clubs like Everton and Leicester.
In a statement Barca said: ‘The board of directors accept, as a matter of urgency, to form part of, and be one of the founders of, the Super League.’
It went on to say the premise of the competition was: ‘To improve the quality and attractiveness of the spectacle offered to football fans and, at the same time, and as an inalienable principle of FC Barcelona, to seek new formulas of solidarity with the entire football family.’
Barcelona president Joan Laporta had gone on the record to say the project could kill the essence of football several times in the build-up to the elections to become president last March but it seems having seen the club’s accounts he has U-turned.
The club said it would have been ‘an historic mistake to not form part of the innitiative’.
Barcelona’s only nod to the outrage so far aimed at the planned project was to say that any proposal would be put to its members to vote on and it said the subject needed to be analysed in much greater depth.
Despite the ESL’s president Florentino Perez saying it had been discussed and planned for the last three years, Barcelona said: ‘This exercise needs in-depth analysis and requires time and the necessary composure to avoid taking any rash action.’
The club’s positive stance echoed comments made by president Laporta earlier in the day but completely contradicted those of club captain Pique.
Laporta said:’The Super League is absolutely necessary.’
But Pique told Movistar TV in an interview with Jorge Valdano: ‘Barça is a founder of the Super League and I think that the decision has its reasons in the very serious economic situation the club finds itself in.
‘If I look at it from the point of view of a player, I don’t think it is a positive thing for football in the long-term.
Questioning the maths behind the project he continued: ‘They say the Champions League is bringing in 3.5 billion euros and the Super League will bring in triple. It doesn’t add up. If you talk to the [television] rights experts, they tell you that the market is not there.
‘At the beginning they say that the [big clubs] will stay in the leagues. But the years will go by and behind this there are investment funds, banking companies.
‘If there are losses, they will decide to put the games on at weekends and we will will find a competition model [with matches] for Wednesday and Saturday.
‘That will take the income from the leagues. Then the numbers will add up but you’re tearing up the whole system to get it. Do we want this for football? Do we want that Sevilla, Valencia, Everton, Leicester and Napoli disappear?’
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