Envisioning a Champions League on Tour, a Soccer Investor Demands More for His Money

Top leagues may also be an obstacle. They have been largely opposed to suggestions for new competitions.

The Champions League itself is expected to add at least four more games starting in the 2024 season, and may even overhaul the competition entirely by implementing a so-called Swiss model. Under that proposal, all participants would play 10 games in a league format, with the top eight teams qualifying directly for the knockout stages, while the 16 teams below would compete in a playoff to join them.

The idea of Champions League on tour, similar to what the I.C.C. would like to become, isn’t a new one. In fact, UEFA was considering a something along those lines when Infantino was its chief administrator, before he was elected FIFA’s president in 2016.

To earn UEFA’s seal, the I.C.C. would most likely have to modify its invitation-only model, according to a person familiar with the talks. Clubs would have to be considered on merit, the person said, rather than factors like marketability and the size of their fan bases.

If such an event came to fruition, it could compete with FIFA’s competition and create another front in the often bitter relationship between soccer’s two most powerful figures, Infantino and UEFA’s president, Aleksander Ceferin.

The two have spent much of the last two years clashing over various issues, including FIFA’s World Cup. Most recently, tempers flared after details leaked from a meeting between Infantino and Florentino Pérez, the Real Madrid president, over Pérez’s desire to create a Super League that would unmoor the biggest teams from the domestic competitions in which they have played for decades.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/21/sports/soccer/icc-stephen-ross-summer-tour.html?emc=rss&partner=rss