The large community of football fans in Europe seems to have to get used to increasingly daring reform proposals, including subsequent waves of outrage.
In the spring, the Super League plans of some major clubs caused astonishment, and now the idea of holding world championships every two years from 2028 onwards is being discussed.
The International Football Association FIFA, with its President Gianni Infantino, has presented a corresponding reform proposal for the football calendar, certainly not least driven by the idea of being able to earn even more money.
Aleksander Ceferin, President of the European Football Union UEFA, responded promptly, hoping "FIFA will regain its senses," he said.
This plan would "kill football," he said and threatened to boycott these short-term world tournaments with the South Americans.
"Absolute alarm position"
Perhaps the shouting about this huge topic was not so inconvenient for him, because this week first the European club association ECA, the European Leagues, where the leagues bundle their interests, and UEFA, the sensitive main topic here: The economic framework conditions, among which stars, talents and titles will be fought for in the future. In this context, as a guest speaker at the ECA, Ceferin formulated a sentence that has so far received little public attention, but caused some excitement in the Bundesliga: "Let me emphasize something very important: Financial fair play is not about competitiveness."
For many clubs, this message is more threatening than biannual world championships. "We are all in the league, including those who are involved with the ECA, in absolute alarm position," said Axel Hellmann, the board spokesman of Eintracht Frankfurt, on Wednesday at the sports business congress Spobis. So far, the Financial Fair Play (FFP) has ensured a certain level of competition between the clubs with private investors, oligarchs or the Gulf state behind them and the clubs that earn their money in the traditional ways.
Investors were not allowed - at least in theory - to inject unlimited amounts of money, even if the set of rules was legally contestable and could be circumvented. Now it is "time to develop the formula of financial fair play into a solid financial system that promotes investment and growth," said Ceferin. According to the UEFA boss, the rules should only ensure economic stability and a good climate for investors; the question of the balance of the competition is becoming less important.
That would be a paradigm shift with massive effects on the development of the Bundesliga, where investors are not allowed to take over a majority of votes and therefore only become active in individual cases. The new UEFA model provides for the FFP to be replaced by a salary cap linked to income, which, contrary to what the name suggests, is not just about salaries. According to the details that have become known so far, the clubs are likely to spend 70 percent of their income on transfers, salaries and consultancy fees.
In the event of violations, a luxury tax would be due, which is to be paid to the clubs operating in accordance with the rules. "This tax should be very, very high," said Ceferin to the mirror. “If the rule is that a club is only allowed to spend 300 million euros, but it is 500 million, then it might have to pay another 200 million to go to the others. That has to be a robust set of rules. "