![[FILE] A fIle photo shows Real Madrid president Florentino Pérez and Barcelona president Joan Laporta during the match between Real Madrid and FC Barcelona on matchday 10 of LaLiga EA Sports, played at the Santiago Bernabéu stadium. EFE/Sergio Perez](https://i0.wp.com/efe.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/rss-efeecd595b3b7b760a2b9f173a7be84f74108a7e53bw.webp?fit=1920%2C1276&ssl=1)
Barcelona, Feb 7 (EFE).- FC Barcelona Saturday formally withdrew from the European Super League, notifying the project’s management and participating clubs of its decision and leaving Real Madrid as the only club still openly backing the breakaway initiative.
Although the Catalan side did not provide further explanations, its decision confirms a gradual distancing from the initiative.
Last October, Barcelona president Joan Laporta attended a meeting in Rome of the former European Club Association (ECA), signaling the club’s intention to rejoin the European football mainstream and normalize relations with UEFA and the ECA following the rupture caused by the Super League.
Since the start of the 2025–26 season, Laporta had attempted to build bridges between UEFA and the Super League in search of a possible agreement.
Saturday’s announcement marks Barcelona’s definitive exit from the project led by Real Madrid president Florentino Pérez.
The European Super League was officially launched on April 18, 2021, by 12 founding clubs: Spain’s Real Madrid, Barcelona and Atlético de Madrid; Italy’s AC Milan, Inter Milan and Juventus; and England’s Liverpool, Manchester City, Chelsea, Manchester United and Tottenham Hotspur.
The clubs announced plans for a new competition starting in the 2021–22 season, featuring up to 20 teams: the 12 founders, three invited clubs, among them Paris Saint-Germain, and five additional teams qualifying annually based on sporting merit.
Promoters of the project promised annual revenues of around 400 million euros per club and justified the initiative as a response to what they described as the “instability of the current economic model of European football,” worsened by the COVID-19 pandemic.
From the outset, UEFA, national federations, domestic leagues in Spain, England and Italy, and the ECA strongly opposed the plan.
Following fan protests, the six English clubs withdrew within days, followed shortly by Atlético de Madrid, AC Milan and Inter Milan.
In June 2023, Juventus formally informed Real Madrid and Barcelona of its withdrawal, amid an ongoing legal dispute between the Super League and UEFA that culminated in a ruling by the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) in December 2023.
The court ruled that FIFA and UEFA regulations requiring prior authorization for new club competitions, such as the Super League, violated European Union law. It also found that both bodies had abused their dominant position, while clarifying that a project like the Super League does not automatically have to be authorized.
The penultimate chapter came in early October, when Barcelona publicly staged what was widely seen as its definitive disengagement from the project.
Laporta was a central figure at the annual assembly of the former ECA, now the European Football Clubs (EFC), held last Wednesday in Rome, where he offered to mediate between UEFA and the Super League.
He openly advocated Barcelona’s full reintegration into European football institutions, effectively ending the club’s alignment with Florentino Pérez.
With Barcelona’s withdrawal confirmed, nearly five years after its launch, Real Madrid now stands alone as the last club still associated with the Super League project. EFE
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