If it was a western it could be titled "For a Fistful of Dollars", the story of two ruthless men who, alongside ten companions, take up arms against UEFA and secede. The jackpot that drives these "Twelve bastards"? The prospect of managing and sharing the income from their coup: trying to supplant the UEFA Champions League with a semi-closed European Super League. But before the big final battle, a part of their comrades breaks out, leaving them alone with their dream of quick fortune.

Since their profession of faith on the night of Sunday to Monday, war has been declared between UEFA, its president Aleksander Ceferin, and these rebels. The Super League is "a shameful proposition" from a few clubs "guided by greed", "a spitting in the face of all football lovers," said the head of European football. "We had to be naïve, ignoring that we had snakes near us."

These "snakes" that the Slovenian evokes, it is undoubtedly the duo of men who installed themselves at the head of the Super League: the brand new president-founder, Florentino Perez of Real Madrid, assisted by Andrea Agnelli , of Juventus Turin.

Two club presidents who, throughout their career, have embodied a pragmatic and mercantile vision of football with a constant concern to modernize it at the risk of distorting it.

• Florentino Perez, the “brains” of the Super League who turned Real Madrid into a brand

For a good script, the gang must necessarily have a “brain” and a leader.

Florentino Perez fulfilled this role for the Super League relying on the legitimacy of his club, Real Madrid, winner of Champions League 13, a record.

Florentino Perez has been obsessed with the concept of a closed European League for years.

As early as 2009, the president of Real Madrid launched an appeal on the subject.

In November 2018, the Football Leaks revealed that he had received that same year a first draft of the Super League, with 11 founding clubs and 5 teams invited for a start of competition in 2021.

Little wonder from a man who, since his first term at the head of the “White House” in 2000, has always sworn by excess, glitz and the promise of making Real Madrid a global brand.

His arrival at the head of the club coincides with the era of the “Galactics”, an “all-star” team which arrives from the four corners of Europe to play in Madrid: Perez debauchery Luis Figo at the Barcelona rival for 58 million d euros, an astronomical sum for the time.

Follow in 2001 Zinédine Zidane, who is today his trainer, the Brazilian Ronaldo in 2002 or Beckham in 2003.

This so called "Superleague" is anything but "Super".

This greedy and callous move would spell disaster for our grassroots, for women's football, and the wider football community ... (1/2)

- Luís Figo (@LuisFigo) April 19, 2021

Ousted in 2006 for his management of the club too focused on marketing and the lack of a major title between 2003 and 2007, he returned to the helm in 2009. And spent in a few weeks more than 240 million euros to strengthen the team in recruiting in particular Cristiano Ronaldo and Kaka, the last two Golden Balls of the moment.

The Perez method is starting to pay off and Real Madrid's domination on the European scene is accentuated with four Champions League between 2014 and 2018. Real Madrid has become a formidable cash machine far beyond the athlete.

However, its resounding commercial success should not obscure its chronic level of debt.

This already reached 901 million euros at the beginning of January, for a turnover of 757 million euros.

The boss of the powerful construction group ACS, whose personal fortune is estimated at 1.9 billion euros ($ 2.3 billion) by Forbes, justified his vision of the Super League on Monday: "Football must change and adapt (...) It's not something for the rich. We are doing this to save football, which is at a critical juncture. "

• Andrea Agnelli, the double-play ace

In a western, you also need an ambiguous character, able to maintain the vagueness of his intentions throughout the film.

Andrea Agnelli is one of them.

By now, UEFA president Aleksander Ceferin must undoubtedly see him as a Brutus who stabbed Caesar.

The two men were close friends, to the point that the Slovenian is the godfather of one of the Turinese's daughters.

"I've never seen a person lie so frequently and with such persistence. It's unbelievable," Aleksander Ceferin said on Monday of the Juve boss.

"I spoke to him on Saturday afternoon. He said 'don't worry, these are rumors, I'll call you in an hour', then he turned off his phone."

The following ?

A stab in the back.

While Andrea Agnelli publicly defended the new format "very, very close to an ideal Champions League", he is one of the "twelve mutineers" of the Super League and even takes the vice-presidency of the project.

Like his father, Umberto, Andrea Agnelli was very passionate about the Turin team, owned by the family, from which he took the presidency in 2010. Under his presidency, Juve won nine Italian championships between 2012 and 2020. At the same time, he is working to revolutionize the "Old Lady" by diversifying activities (hotel, museum), by developing sponsorship, by grooming the logo to make it more "universal" with a simple "J". The stock market value of the club has exploded.

"Giovanni Agnelli (his uncle, former boss of Fiat, Editor's note) was the embodiment of Fordism applied to football, Andrea Agnelli is the embodiment of globalization in sport, in the wake of Fiat which is totally globalized", observes for AFP historian Giovanni De Luna, author of a book on the history of the club. "Whether this future is for the good of football or not, I don't know, but Agnelli is totally in this neo-football."

The peak of this strategy was reached in 2018 with the recruitment of the five-time Ballon d'Or Cristiano Ronaldo, from Florentino Perez.

Even if, three years later, opinions diverge on the balance sheet, while Juve failed in C1 and is about to be dethroned in Italy: "Operation Ronaldo was above all a merger between two brands. It brought significant results with titles but, in my opinion, it unbalanced the internal balances a little within Juve ", remarks Giovanni De Luna.

#Agnelli: “Is football a game or a business?

Football is no longer a game but an industrial sector and we need stability (...) Today, the match that is worth the most is not the final of the C1 but the play-off for the Premier League.

It's not stability ”

- GuillaumeMP (@Guillaumemp) April 20, 2021

"Developing the Champions League: this has always been his fixed idea, first of all to increase its economic value," Marco Iaria, journalist at Gazzetta dello sport, told AFP, pointing to Agnelli's admiration for football American and his "Superbowl".

Like his Real Madrid counterpart, the president of Juventus Turin is obsessed with the escape of youth who would no longer watch football, their brain time available for the football being competition by video games and Netflix: ”I five children of different ages and I watch their behavior.

They don't have the patience to stay 90 minutes watching a match, we have to adapt to the habits of future supporters, ”he explained last January, calling for the game to be reformed.

"We were all born as a game and have statutes and rules of the game, but we can no longer roll the dice and see what figure comes out, today we are an industry of 25 billion", he explained a few hours before that English clubs do not announce their "Brexit" of the Super League.

“Football is no longer a game but an industrial sector and it needs stability”, he explained, referring to “a blood pact” between the twelve founders.

A not so deep promise given the latest developments.

In this fiasco, the Italian may have lost the biggest part: to follow through on his convictions, he resigned his position as president of the Association of European Clubs (ECA) in the wake of the launch of the Super league.

Not sure that we accept that he becomes again the spokesperson for the clubs.

🚨 Andrea Agnelli renounces the #SuperLeague:



"I am convinced of the goodness of the project but we cannot do the #SuperLeague with 6 teams."

pic.twitter.com/DJcfMjZdrV

- FrSerieA (@FrSerieA) April 21, 2021

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