Breakaways or crossing borders: What is the future of European football?

With the game at an inflection point there comes a warning that ‘in a few weeks’ time its future is going to be pretty dark’

Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola with the UEFA Champions League Trophy following victory over Inter Milan in the UEFA Champions League Final at the Ataturk Olympic Stadium, Istanbul. Picture date: Saturday June 10, 2023.

THE delegates filing into a conference room in central Brussels could not have missed the huge multishaded mural, a block further down Rue de la Loi, that read “The future is Europe”.

They took their places and for the next two hours heard panellists discuss what, in a football context, that future should look like.