UEFA president Aleksander Ceferin has told Celtic and Rangers some of their future Champions League games could be held in AMERICA.
The prized European trophy will undergo major surgery in 2024 as it adopts the Swiss model. But the lingering talk of a continental Super League has refused to go away and now Ceferin has lobbed another charged grenade into the increasingly frosty arena of European football politics.
With football growing in popularity in the States, he tells Men in Blazers that some games from Europe's biggest tournament could be held in America. Currently, Celtic are on course to have a Champions League group stage place again next season with a league title win while the qualifiers are the likely route Rangers will need to take to reach that frontier again. But in the future, there could be long trips across continents, with Ceferin explaining when asked if there could be meaningful European games in the US over the next two decades: "It is possible (Champions League in U.S.) We started to discuss about that, but then one year it is World Cup, 2024 is Euro.
"This year is Istanbul, '24 in London, '25 in Munich (the finals). And after that let's see. It's possible, it's possible. Football is extremely popular in United States these days. Americans are willing to pay this amount (gestures high with hand) for best and nothing for the less. So they will follow European football as basketball lovers in Europe follow NBA.
"It's a very important promising market for the future. The thing is that we are selling rights very well. Sponsorship is so-so for now from the U.S., but here (in U.S.) commercialisation is completely different than in Europe. They (Americans) are much more talented for that than us (Europeans).
"What shocked me actually is that our Euro (2020) finals, Europe national team finals, was watched by more people in United States than NBA Finals. What shocked me is that 30 matches of the Euros, every match viewership was a Super Bowl viewership, so I think we are doing well."
