Faced with a Champions League reform which he considers unfair towards France, the President of the French club AS Saint-Etienne and of the Première Ligue union, is working towards a “rebalancing” of the governance of European football. As a signatory member of the “Manifesto for European football”, he explains why European football and its model are at a decisive turning point in an exclusive interview.
At the end of August 2016, the UEFA Executive Committee adopted an important decision concerning the evolution of the format of the Champions League: for the period 2018- 2021, Spain, England, Germany and Italy will have four places guaranteed in the group stage of the Champions League because of their strong results in the past in this competition. How do you judge this reform?
Regarding the form, this reform was judged by all the European professional leagues, as by more than 90% of the European clubs, in a negative way insofar as nor the leagues nor the clubs were consulted. We learned in Monaco at the end of August 2016, in the drawings of the European cups, that this reform was decided urgently and voted by the UEFA Board where Bayern and Juventus, at the origin of the reform, are sitting. This even happened before the election of a new...
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