Let me preface this with the confession that I was the one person who supported the Super League.
But hot take and this in not a likely prediction or anything, but very much a hot take.
If a major change in the football landscape is incoming it’s the fifa club world cup gaining relevance. I say this bc if Saudi Arabia can have 6 teams stacked with top players and a decent league around that you have another massive league, meanwhile Qatar and the MLS are attracting top players too.
If there can be 5 Non European leagues which have 2 teams that are UCL level an expansion would make sense.
But if that happens, quality players will be spread across even more leagues and the bottom half teams across the European clubs will get worse and worse, clubs like Werder Bremen, Rayo Vallecano, Empoli cannot compete at a decent level in such a world.
Best case scenario, the domestic season becomes an 18 game season with 10 teams in the top division with the fifa club world cup in whatever way its formatted being the primary revenue generator for top clubs.
This could make the UCL either another competition or it could make it the lower tier competition. Perhaps smth like the Euros even.
The primary revenue generation comes from tv rights not ticket sales. The more global the sport grows the more valuable those tv deals become.
In no way does this end domestic rivalries. It just expands the teams that play. I mean what history or rivalry do Madrid have with Union Berlinor Braga in thr UCL. Ofc I’m not suggesting ending the domestic league! But Espanyol, Elche, Leganes, Levante etc are already playing in the second division. Many domestic rivals are already not playing against each other. I’m simply suggesting a smaller top division to reduce the lowest quality football.
Barca v Getafe or Cadiz wouldn’t sell many tickets, idk how valuable that game is in the calender.
Yeah, you might want to rethink that.
Domestic rivalries can exist in the second division too, just as they do now! And the top rivalries stay in the top flight. Betis and sevilla still play each other in the top flight, but The Asturian Derby with Real Oviedo vs Sporting Gijon is already in the second division and is one of Spains major rivalries.
I mean there’s no catalan derby anyways with espanyol being relegated. Las Palmas and tenerife are in different divisions too.
Its just a restructure of who plays whom and how often, not the end of football clubs.
Sorry, I have to reiterate my disagreement. I can see your point but to me what you are suggesting is actually the end of football I as a European have grown up with.
First of all, moving the top clubs to an international, top division is a travesty, believe me the last thing I want to see is Madrid play with some random club from Saudi Arabia because they have Ronaldo. And I reckon the majority of the match-going fans feel like this.
Second, you’ll be surprised how disinterested people from a given European country are with the football of another. Just look at the demeanor English clubs have towards European competitions.
Third and maybe most important, football is the game of the people, this fixation with money, TV rights, international tours, Messi and Ronaldo is slowly drowning the life out of the game. The last thing we need is another plastic competition, this time with some random clubs nobody cares about. I’ll say it again, this is not the NBA, not the NFL, not the NHL, you get the picture.