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According to The Telegraph, Real Madrid, Barcelona and Juventus have plans to relaunch the European Super League (ESL) project this week. While the initial plans failed, and many originally participating clubs have left the project, the European giants in Spain and Italy remain highly interested.
The three clubs are reportedly seeking to rebrand the Super League and remove the concept of permanent membership to get the project off the ground again. Juventus president Andrea Agnelli is reportedly set to announce plans to scrap the deeply unpopular model that saw the competition keep European juggernauts as permanent members.
The Super League will now have a traditional domestic league qualification as Juventus, alongside Real Madrid and Barcelona, hope to improve public perception of their planned enterprise.
The European trio will also hope to secure a favourable hearing against UEFA at the European Court of Justice later in the year. With their efforts to rebrand, a favourable hearing could see the ESL project resume in earnest again.
The ESL has also continued to be highly critical of UEFA as it aimed a sly dig at Gulf-funded clubs in their statement:
“Uefa has close ties to certain club owners from non-member states who are commercial sponsors of certain competitions and clubs, are the main buyers of media rights for competitions operated by Uefa and who sit on Uefa’s executive committee, while chairing the ECA without any transparent election process.
“Since within the EU, a club cannot benefit from state aids (sic) from its own member state … why should it be allowed that the football market be disrupted, to the exclusive benefit of a few state-owned clubs, because of state aids coming from non-member states?”
Barcelona, Real Madrid and Juventus are planning friendlies in USA this summer - Reports
According to ESPN, the Super League trio are making plans for friendly games that will take place in the USA this summer. It is believed that the three clubs have contacted Juventus' rival AC Milan to become the fourth team in their set of friendly matches.
While venues are currently undecided, the report states that the fixtures would be played on the West Coast, and would include El Clasico. These matches are being planned partly in a bid to increase profits after the COVID-19 pandemic hurt the game financially.
The first El Clasico outside Spain was notably played in Miami back in 2017. With these potential fixtures underway, it likely won't be the last.
