The full extent of Gianni Infantino's involvement in the proposed European Super League has been laid bare by a term sheet, dated October 2020, that reveals the Fifa president held talks about rebranding the ill-fated breakaway competition as the "Fifa Super League". The document, whose complete contents have been reported for the first time by The Guardian, suggests discussions between Fifa's leadership and the scheme's architects had progressed far further than was ever publicly acknowledged.

What the term sheet actually says

The document outlines a proposed partnership of at least 12 years between Fifa and the Super League, with a joint venture set up to run its commercial operations. Under the arrangement, Fifa would have been granted special governance and political rights through a so-called "golden share", giving the governing body significant control over the new competition's direction.

Crucially, the term sheet also envisaged an annual version of Fifa's expanded Club World Cup — described in the document as the "global club competition" — tied directly to the Super League and played over an enshrined three-week window each year. That version would have been a straight knockout tournament rather than the group-stage format that eventually relaunched in 2025. The founding clubs were to number 15 permanent members, with five further places available through qualification from existing competitions.

While a term sheet is non-binding, it is typically the stage immediately preceding a formal contract. That talks reached this point indicates discussions were approaching a conclusion at some point in late 2020 — months before the project was publicly launched, and then swiftly collapsed, in April 2021.

Fifa's member associations bypassed

Perhaps the most damaging revelation concerns the way Fifa's own member associations were treated. According to the document, federations around the world are understood to have been bypassed in the plan's formation, even as the term sheet itself stated that any new tournaments would formally require approval from Fifa's annual congress and council. Infantino is understood to have been fully aware of how the project was developing, and Fifa staff were involved throughout.

When the Super League was publicly announced without Fifa's direct involvement in April 2021, it prompted large-scale protests from supporters, including demonstrations outside grounds across England. Infantino subsequently addressed Uefa's congress in Montreux, stating that his organisation could "only strongly disapprove the creation of the Super League". Multiple sources have told The Guardian that a prior conversation with Uefa president Aleksander Ceferin, arranged by a third party, accelerated Infantino's decision to distance himself from the venture.

A pattern of behaviour

The timing of this disclosure is significant. It arrives in a week when football has already been reeling from the fallout of Infantino scrapping a separate scheme to sell portions of the World Cup to private investors — his so-called Football Forward Enterprise plan. Taken together, both episodes point to a governing body whose leadership was repeatedly prepared to pursue fundamental changes to the sport's structures without meaningful consultation with the stakeholders most affected.

The term sheet also committed to establishing a women's equivalent competition using the same founding clubs, though no specific date was attached to that pledge. Whether that commitment reflected genuine ambition for the women's game or was simply a line inserted to broaden political support remains unclear from the document alone.

What is clear is that the picture of Infantino's Fifa as a passive bystander to the Super League — an organisation that reacted with horror when the breakaway was announced — no longer holds. The evidence now in the public domain tells a considerably different story.

FAQs

Frequently asked

What was the Fifa Super League proposal?
A term sheet dated October 2020 reveals that Fifa, under Gianni Infantino, held talks about rebranding the European Super League as the 'Fifa Super League'. The document proposed a 12-year partnership, a joint commercial venture, and gave Fifa a 'golden share' with special governance rights over the new competition.
Why did the European Super League collapse in 2021?
After the Super League was publicly launched in April 2021 without Fifa's direct involvement, it faced massive backlash from supporters, players, and governments across Europe. Large-scale protests — including demonstrations outside English grounds — forced the founding clubs to withdraw within days of the announcement.
How many clubs would have been in the Super League?
According to the term sheet reported by The Guardian, the league would have contained 15 permanent founding members and five additional places for clubs qualifying through existing competitions.