April 26 – The World Leagues Forum (WLF), which represents more than 40 professional league worldwide, has issued a statement calling for leagues to be better represented in football governance in the wake of the breakaway European Super League (ESL) furore.
April 26 – In an unprecedented show of anti-discrimination unity, the entire professional pyramid of English football have joined forces to boycott social media next weekend in response to the online abuse aimed at players in recent weeks.
April 26 – South American football will face a demanding calendar this summer as governing body Conmebol announced that World Cup qualifying will resume in June before the Copa America kicks off.
April 26 – Wales men’s team coach Ryan Giggs will miss this summer’s rescheduled Euros after being charged with assaulting two women.
By Andrew Warshaw
April 23 – Bilbao and Dublin have been stripped of hosting rights by UEFA for this summer’s delayed Euro 2020 Championship because of concerns over whether fans would be definitely be allowed into stadia.
By Paul Nicholson
April 23 – Suspicions are multiplying that the hand of FIFA president Gianni Infantino was present behind the scenes in the encouragement of the 12 breakaway European Super League clubs.
By Samindra Kunti
April 23 – Amid a firestorm of condemnation and outrage at secretly concocted European Super League (ESL) plans, FC Barcelona have signalled their continued commitment to a proposed closed-shop, elite competition, highlighting “a need for structural reforms” and calling the backlash “intimidation” in an unapologetic statement.
April 23 –Concacaf has released detail of the nine stadia that will host Gold Cup group stages and knock-out rounds this summer with a focus on centralising matches around city hubs to reduce team travel.
By Paul Nicholson
April 22 – Spain’s Laliga, and its clubs, are keeping their foot firmly on the pedal of opposition to the now fractured European Super League. With its two biggest clubs – Real Madrid and Barcelona – belligerent in their belief that the ESL is the way forward, the league’s clubs issued a statement rejecting the format, followed by a press conference that forcefully emphasised their unity in opposition.
By David Owen
April 22 – The 2019-20 European club football season was overshadowed, interrupted and ultimately elongated by covid. Even so, UEFA still managed to distribute well over €2.4 billion to the clubs which took part in its main competitions.
April 22 – Even in defeat, Real Madrid president Florentino Perez remains defiant. In an interview on Spanish radio, the Madrid supremo doubled down on the European Super League (ESL), claiming the proposed competition is “on standby”.
By Andrew Warshaw
April 22 – When Paris St Germain were conspicuous by their absence as a member of the so-called “dirty Dozen” clubs who formed the elitist but ill-fated European Super League, UEFA president Aleksander Ceferin made a point of personally praising PSG boss Nasser Al-Khelaifi for refusing to join the much derided cartel.
April 22 – American bank JP Morgan, who underwrote initial investment in the European Super League (ESL), have been hit with a downgraded sustainability rating as integrity issues have been raised over the bank’s role in the wake of the ESL collapse.
April 22 – As the repercussions of the collapse of the European Super League begin to take shape, Manchester United’s American co-chairman Joel Glazer has become the latest high-profile figure to “apologise unreservedly” to fans for the club’s involvement in the aborted project, saying United failed to show respect to the “deep-rooted traditions” of the English game.
By Paul Nicholson
April 22 – Emanuel Macedo de Medeiros, former European Leagues boss and head of global integrity group SIGA, has said the collapse of the European Super League proposal presents a “unique opportunity to redefine European football” and move away from the days of the ‘gun on the table’ negotiations of Europe’s super wealthy clubs.