European Super League is ‘binding’ and will ‘save football at critical moment’, says president Florentino Perez

Real Madrid chief and the president of the European Super League Florentino Perez, has claimed that the new competition will “save football at a critical moment”.

He added that the agreement among 12 leading European clubs - including Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool, Manchester City, Manchester United and Tottenham - to take part in this new league was “binding”.

In his first interview since the competition was unveiled, he said that the financial difficulties from the Covid-19 pandemic also played a part in the plans.

European Super League comment: If this dirty dozen want to go, let them

‘It’s not just the rich who want the Super League’

He told El Chiringuito: “The attractive thing in football is playing between the big clubs, the value for television increases and more income is generated.

“It’s not just the rich who want the Super League, we’re doing it to save football because it’s at a critical moment.”

He added: “Football must evolve like everything in life.

“Football has to adapt to the times we live in now, football is losing interest, TV rights are decreasing.

“We wanted to do the Super League, the pandemic has given us urgency.”

Why is European Super League bad for football? Uefa and Premier League opposition to new competition explained

‘We will take all the sanctions that we can’

Mr Perez’s comments come as UEFA president Aleksander Ceferin said the organisation was working on banning the breakaway Super League clubs and their players from its competitions “as soon as possible”.

Ceferin and the rest of the UEFA hierarchy is still seeking legal advice on the steps it could take to sanction the “dirty dozen” – as he called them at one point – and said it was still too early to say when they would know what form the sanctions could take.

But he said: “We will take all the sanctions that we can and we will inform you as soon as we have a clear answer about it, but my opinion is that (we must do that) as soon as possible.

“They have to be banned from all our competitions and the players from our competitions.”