European Super League plan is pulled apart by fans on social media

Fans have wasted no time pulling apart the new plan for the European Super League, following Thursday's court ruling which paved the way its return.

The new format - which was revealed by A22 CEO Bernd Reichart - will see both a men's and women's competition, with 64 teams competing in the men's and 32 in the women's.

In terms of the men's competition, the 64 clubs will be split into three separate leagues - star, gold and blue - with the star league the strongest and blue the weakest.

Each team will be guaranteed 14 matches with everyone playing their group stage opponents home and away on midweek dates between September and April.

The top four clubs from both groups in the gold and star leagues and the top two teams in the four blue groups will then take part in their respective league's knockout stages during the spring.

Fans took to social media to voice a myriad of problems with the plan, from the competition's similarity to the current system to the uninspired choice of names for the league.

'This would obviously be much better than the original idea, but it's still just a way for the big clubs to cement their place at the top.' One user wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

'The domestic league performance of the teams in the top tier would not be relevant at all as long as they perform in the ESL.'

Another wrote: 'No permanent members’ but all of us big teams automatically are placed in the star league and get billions split between only us!!!! Shove it.'

The star and gold leagues will have 16 teams separated into two groups of eight, but the blue league will have 32 clubs, split across four groups of eight.

Sports consultancy firm A22, which is leading the plan, insisted it was 'based on sporting merit with no permanent