UEFA President Aleksandar Ceferin has argued that a distinction can be drawn between the six Premier League clubs and others such as Inter, following the collapse of the European Super League.
Inter were joined by AC Milan and Juventus, as well as La Liga clubs Atletico Madrid, Barcelona, and Real Madrid in forming a breakaway league, and were joined by six English teams.
Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool, Manchester City, Manchester United, and Tottenham Hotspur were also involved, but all abandoned the plan in midweek following widespread backlash.
In an interview with British tabloid The Daily Mail, Ceferin argued that the decision of the Premier League clubs to pull out earlier than their Italian and Spanish counterparts ought to be noted, with Inter amongst a second group to abandon the project.
“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,'” Ceferin claimed.
“They don’t have problems because of anyone else but themselves. It’s not OK what they did and we will see in next few days what we have to do.
“But for me there’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.'”
Ceferin was highly critical of the remaining three clubs involved in the project, Barcelona, Juventus, and Real Madrid, and likened them to flat Earth conspiracy theorists. Inter, meanwhile, withdrew alongside Milan and Atletico Madrid.
“For me there are three groups of this 12, the English Six, who went out first, then the other three 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.
“Everyone will be held responsible. In what way, we will see. I don’t want to talk about the disciplinary process but it must be clear that everyone must be held accountable in a different way. Is it disciplinary? Is it the decision of the executive committee? We’ll see. It is too early to say.”
The Slovenian also launched a stinging attack on Juventus President Andrea Agnelli, after accusing him of lying about the Super League last week.
“I was even thanking Agnelli (in a UEFA Conference address). I changed the speech four times since. They were preparing stuff they didn’t tell me, the guy 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,” Ceferin added.
The 53-year-old also insisted that financial clout was not enough to force such a huge change on European football and thanked those who opposed the Super League.
“The joint effort of UEFA, the fans and the entire football community has shown that not everything is for sale, that you can’t come with the billions and say, ‘I don’t care about tradition, history, the things you love, because I have enough money to buy everything”, he added.