NEIL Doncaster, the SPFL chief executive, has warned that UEFA risk “irreversibly damaging” Scottish football if they close off entry to the Champions League to its leading club.
Doncaster last month welcomed the news that the “champions route” into Europe’s premier club competition would be retained by the governing body in the three year cycle starting in the 2018/19 season.
The top four clubs in England, Germany, Italy and Spain will all qualify automatically for the group stages under the new format – a move which has been made to prevent the continent’s biggest clubs following through on a threat to form a breakaway competition.
However, Doncaster, speaking at the Leaders 2016 conference held at Stamford Bridge yesterday, is concerned that UEFA were so willing to placate the more powerful clubs on the continent.
Many of Europe’s richest clubs wanted the “champions route”, which former UEFA president Michel Platini introduced seven years ago in order to enable clubs from lesser leagues to qualify, to be scrapped.
Doncaster believes if that happens in the future it will have an adverse impact on the game in Scotland and in other lesser footballing nations.
"The threat is very real, very significant," he said. "The direction of travel that UEFA have embarked upon is a very dangerous route.
"It threatens the very future of very top-level football and it is vital that a line is drawn in the sand now and the EPFL (European Professional Football Leagues) take the firm stand that is required and start the pulling back of the very damning proposals.
"It is important to be a domestic champion club, that is the same across Europe, it is about access to the top-tier of European competitive football with the other champions of European football.
"Remove that and you fundamentally remove what is important about being a champion in a domestic contest. You would damage irreversibly the mid-level domestic leagues.You would see interest in all the leagues that are excluded inevitably declining and that would damage the game."
Doncaster added: "I have been in the game 20 years, I have never seen the game in Europe as united against a set of proposals. It is unique that you have representatives of the small, large and medium-sized leagues against damaging proposals from UEFA.
"The closed-shop is the direction of travel a number in Europe would like to see and it is outrageous that UEFA can preside over a situation where that is the direction of travel.
"The fear is that we end up with a closed-league situation. I was at the Celtic v Manchester City game last week, probably one of the best group games and a fantastic spectacle enjoyed by many across the world.
"You remove that romance and it is all about money and that is to the detriment of the game, not just in Scottish football but across the world.”
Meanwhile, Lars-Christer Olsson, the chairman of European Professional Football Leagues, has claimed UEFA have broken their memorandum of understanding with the EPFL by not consulting them over the planned changes.
That has led to a threat from the EPFL to renege on the memorandum and allow their member associations to schedule domestic fixtures that clash with Champions League and Europa League matches.
"They (UEFA) are setting all the conditions for a private, closed league in the future," he said. "Theoretically, it is a free market, so if a number of clubs would like to set up their own competition they can do that. I don't think they will because domestic competitions are much more important.
“In my opinion UEFA has forced EPFL to act because UEFA has broken the agreement, we were not at all consulted.
"The process has not only been wrong, it has been slow. We have to come to a conclusion fairly soon for the best solution for European football and that can only be made by talking to each other."
Olsson did say there would be no instances of a team in the Champions League being made to choose between playing in the continental competition or fulfilling a domestic fixture.
"You have to remember that we are a union of clubs representing the clubs in Europe's competitions," he added.
"We would not create problems for our own clubs because that would not be sensible. We are reasonably well-educated."
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