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| An obligatory sight on Champions League nights. Pic: Kieran Lynam. |
It's a formula that has worked so well over the past number of seasons, but now there appears to be the real possibility of UEFA bowing to pressure from some of the continent's leading clubs and revamping its flagship club tournament. While the present format, which is in its 13th year and is bound for at least two more thanks to the contractual obligations set about by TV rights, has been a resounding success, it might not be in existence for much longer. Clubs from Germany, Spain, Italy and other mainland European nations are looking on with envy at the billions being pumped into the Premier League, with even the worst performers in the English top flight standing to reap huge financial rewards. When the new TV rights deal kicks into the Premier League next season, its bottom club will receive £100 million, twice the prize money on offer to the Champions League winners at present.
The new format being proposed will see the competition proper begin with 32 teams, as it does now, but rather than being divided into eight groups of four, this opening round will be played as a two-legged knockout and the 16 winners will then enter a group stage comprising of two groups of eight, with teams to play one another home and away. This will entail 14 group games for each club. Where the tournament goes from there as regards quarter-finals, semi-finals etc hasn't been properly established.
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| Manchester City v Barcelona could become a near-annual fixture under the new format. Pic: Ver en vido En Directo. |
The school of thought fuelling this revamp is that the continent's top sides, such as Barcelona and Bayern Munich, are currently playing too many lopsided group games against teams from mid-ranking European leagues who realistically have no hope of winning the competition. It's not the lack of competitiveness on the field that's causing consternation, though. It's more the lack of money to be made from these fixtures being a hard sell in terms of attendances and viewership figures. The clubs spearheading the proposed format are doing so on the basis that they want regular bouts with one another, in effect creating a European 'Super League', an idea that has frequently been mooted since the turn of the millennium.
While this makes financial sense, from a purely footballing point of view it would be a disaster for the game in Europe. There is already enough of a disparity between the Champions League's contenders and outsiders, and the proposed new format would only serve to drive this gap even wider. Although a return to the pre-Champions League era where the champions of Malta, Wales and Albania routinely met the league winners from Spain, Italy and England is clearly out of the question, the champions of 'lesser' nations should at least have a reasonable opportunity to, however briefly, rub shoulders with Europe's elite. Michel Platini's administrative reputation may now be in the gutter, but his restructuring of the Champions League in 2009 to allow for more domestic champions to qualify for the group stage was admirable in the extreme. It has allowed clubs such as Astana, MSK Zilina, Nordsjaelland and Ludogorets Razgrad to reach the group stage when previously they would have been highly unlikely to do so. It has ensured that clubs like APOEL Nicosia can reach the quarter-finals of the competition, proving that the champions of mid-ranking nations are not merely making up the numbers in the Champions League.
Those pushing for the tournament to be revamped are basically saying to the clubs mentioned above that they have no business being in the Champions League simply because they're not fashionable enough to put bums on stadium seats or in front of TV screens. What sort of a message is that sending out to the sport? As Leicester are so brilliantly proving this season, teams can always emerge from the shadows and stand tall over the Goliaths of the game. The Champions League isn't immune to producing unexpected winners, either - look at Porto and Liverpool in the mid-2000s. Would either of those teams have even come close to winning the competition if it was played in the format being proposed for 2018-19? I seriously doubt it.
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| Clubs like APOEL Nicosia should not be frozen out of the Champions League. Pic: George Groutas. |
The beauty of the Champions League in its current guise is that it gives us both the opportunity to see progressive clubs making history and building legacies, as well as ample showdowns between the continent's most famous names. The existing format works very well, although the month it takes to complete the round of 16 is a bit excessive (again, this was structured as such for TV purposes; there had been four matches a night rather than two up to 2009). If a team goes automatically into the group stage and advances to the final, they will play 13 games in the tournament, which is not an unreasonable number and it's fewer than the amount of matches required under the proposed new format, which ironically is being mooted partly to ease supposed fixture congestion in the autumn months. Figure that one out!
As a football fan, I sincerely hope these proposals are shot down and the Champions League, a fantastic tournament, is retained in its current format. European football does not need an elitist Super League. Unfortunately, I think that's the road down which it is set to travel. In 21st century football, money doesn't so much talk as roar deafeningly through a megaphone. What the big clubs want, the big clubs usually get, and quite often it's to the detriment of the have-nots who are swimming upstream trying to grow as a club. If regular shootouts between the elite few are what will generate the bucks, then it seems sadly inevitable that this will be European football's new, undemocratic reality.
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