Not many competitions are as alluring as the UEFA Champions League. The lights, the music, the thrill at the sight of Europe’s teams going head-to-head on the Road to {Insert European city here}. Even the introductory montages are good. The allure is undeniable, the charm is irresistible, and the captivation is evident. Which is just as well, because amidst all these things, it’s almost easy to forget what the Champions League, in its current form, actually is; a fraud.
One of the notable words from renowned commentator Clive Tyldesley is when, as the knockout phase of the Champions League comes around, remarks how ‘the Champions League becomes the European Cup again’. His reference to the old European Cup format is one many make, and memories of it are ones many fondly hark back. When Europe’s top-club competition was simply about teams duking it out in knockout games from start to finish.
All that changed in the 90’s, when a group stage was added, and there was a round-robin format before we reached the knockout rounds. But the group stage isn’t quite what’s wrong with the competition. Some may argue it’s still part of it; many simply let the group games while away – as they watch sides like Real Madrid make a meal of their opening two games and still go through with a game to spare. Hence the reason many look forward to any potential Group of Death.
The group phase is also a factor in why teams constantly play each other in the competition. The latest draw sees Real Madrid, Inter, and Shakhtar Donetsk in the same group for the second year in a row, same applies for PSG and RB Leipzig, not the mention the old running of Manchester City and Shakhtar for what seemed like every season.
But the existence of the group stage itself isn’t quite the main issue (yes, to you about to point out that love for the pure knockout phase era is based on pure nostalgia, hold on). When UEFA announced they were getting rid of the away goals rule ahead of this season, they made the point of not letting a goal be more valuable than another. In terms of the Champions League in itself, we’re at a stage whereby leagues are (deemed) more valuable than others.
How else would you explain the fact that in a competition of 52 leagues (associations), just four of them astonishingly make up 50% of the automatic group stage spots (this season, five leagues make up almost 60% of the slots)? What other reason is there for a seeding system, in which certain teams can’t meet each other until certain stages? Or why the leagues with more television coverage and media focus are always seeded higher. There’s little other reason, other than the fact that the Champions League, in its current state, is the epitome of raging inequality in football and an example of institutionalised cheating. For the past few years, it’s looked more like organised crime than organised competition.
There have been a handful of alterations to the format of the competition that have been towards the so-called big clubs. From the implementation of the group stage itself to the rule that meant four leagues would have four automatic spots, with came into place in 2017. ‘In the way it was done, it's a scandal’, said Bernard Caiazzo in 2016 over that latter change, and while the president of France’s Premiere Ligue Union was mostly worried about Ligue 1 than showing egalitarian concern for the state of European football, the statement holds. ‘It's the first step towards a closed European league -- a way of allowing rich clubs to earn even more money’, and the changes that will come into place from 2024 will further cement that point.
This skewered system is also what led to the birth of the Europa Conference League, the oddly-named third European competition. The Conference League is littered with a handful of unheralded teams, and in some quarters is being praised as a way to let smaller sides play continental football. Why there is a point to that, it also makes it seem like the supposed big leagues have some divine right to be in the continent’s top competition. There’s no reason why Rangers should follow up winning the Scottish Premiership, or Salzburg the Austrian top-flight, and have to start at the lower reaches of qualifying, while fourth-placed Juventus in Italy, or Chelsea in England get an automatic group stage slot.
Framing the Champions League as a right for the five leagues is part of the reason behind the creation of a smaller competition to keep the small fries quite content, while those at the top partake in the one with greater finances. Of course, Greater finances equal greater media exposure and greater players. Greater players mean better performances. Better performances mean greater finances. Rinse, repeat.
Not to mention how (pointlessly) playing so many games and traveling does unnecessary damage to the planet, an area for which the governing bodies of football have little concern. Hence, the expanded Club World Cup and international World Cup, as well as the multi-national European Championship earlier in the summer. Football has more than embraced its capitalist mould, with increasing inequality, and profiteering towards planetary destruction.
We’re very much at a point when the European Clubs Association, ECA, represents little more than five leagues, and more aptly, about 12 clubs. Since the failed Super League plot in April, UEFA have had the chance to posture as the good guys in football. But they’ve continued to remind us their gripe with that move was less about the soul of football, and more of them not having a role in its continued destruction.
The Champions League will go on, with its allure and spellbinding charm. Many will watch, as despite being us in a stage whereby football is not-so important in football anymore, we’re also in a situation whereby football can still cover up the flaws of football. But we’re watching a broken system churn out a flawed competition, with the word ‘competition’ looking more and more like an impostor. UEFA – with 2024 changes in particular – through years of caving and complicity, have helped turn European football’s top club competition into little more than the worst cool kids’ table. The Champions League needs to be saved from itself, and more pertinently, from UEFA.
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