UEFA president Aleksander Ceferin insists the 12 clubs that signed up to the Super League project must be punished.
A dozen of Europe’s biggest sides announced they were breaking away from the Champions League last Sunday.
However, amid a backlash from supporters, players, managers, sponsors, broadcasters and governments, all six English teams withdrew from the project within 48 hours.
Arsenal, Liverpool, Chelsea, Manchester United, Manchester City and Tottenham were soon followed by club in Italy and Spain.
Real Madrid, Juventus and Barcelona have yet to give up on the project, though, and that could land them in hot water with UEFA.
Ceferin believes the six English clubs should be treated with leniency because they pulled out of the Super League earlier.
But the 53-year-old believes UEFA cannot simply brush the events of the last week under the carpet, and he did not rule out potential bans from the Champions League.
“Let’s see [about punishments],” he told the Mail on Sunday. “Everyone has to take consequences for what they did and we cannot pretend nothing happened. You cannot do something like that and just say: ‘I’ve been punished because everybody hates me.’
“They don’t have problems because of anyone else but themselves. It’s not OK what they did and we will see in the next few days what we have to do.
“But for me it’s a clear difference between the English clubs and the other six. They pulled out first, they admitted they made a mistake. You have to have some greatness to say: ‘I was wrong.’
“For me there are three groups of this 12 — the English six, who went out first, then the other three [Atletico Madrid, AC Milan, Inter] after them and then the ones who feel that Earth is flat and they think the Super League still exists.
“And there is a big difference between those. But everyone will be held responsible. In what way, we will see.”
Ceferin praised the coordinated response of supporters and the actions of the British government, which threatened to drop a ‘legislative bomb’ to stop the Super League.
“It was very stressful,” he added. “I felt like I had been put into a washing machine. On Saturday, I went to Switzerland from my home country, eight-hour drive. I had everything ready to speak about the reforms and everything in my speech.
“I was even thanking [Juventus president, Andrea] Agnelli. I changed the speech four times since. They were preparing stuff they didn’t tell me, the guy [Agnelli] was lying to me saying: ‘“It’s not true, it’s not true…’ In the end, it happened and I have to tell publicly what happened.’
“Look, honestly speaking I was completely impressed by the reaction of the fans, the whole football community and not just the football community but I would say society. I’ve never seen this.
“UEFA did its part, the clubs that stood with us did their part. And of course the UK Government out of all did the big part. But by far the biggest part was done by fans.
“Absolutely I was impressed by the reaction of UK Government. I had a phone conversation with Prime Minister [Boris] Johnson and State Secretary [Oliver] Dowden many times in this 48 crazy hours. They were on the right side of history at the right time. And this is impressive.
“This joint effort showed that not everything is for sale, that you cannot come with billions and say: ‘I don’t care about tradition, history the things that you love, because I have enough money I will buy all.’ No way! It doesn’t go through.
“I don’t want to say disciplinary process but it has to be clear that everyone has to be held responsible in a different way. Is it disciplinary? Is it the decision of the executive committee? We will see. It’s too early to say.”
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