JP Morgan APOLOGISES for backing European Super League bid

JP Morgan has apologised for its role in plans for the failed breakaway European Super League. 

The American investment bank said on Monday it had committed around £2.8billion as start-up capital for the league which posed a direct challenge to UEFA’s Champions League and also threatened to devalue Europe’s top domestic leagues.

Twelve clubs announced they had signed up to compete on Sunday but by Wednesday afternoon nine had withdrawn.

Fan protests and outrage from UEFA, FIFA, leagues, clubs, players and even politicians, made the league a non-starter.

And while the bank was expecting some controversy, sources say it was taken aback by the level of public uproar.

The bank released a short statement yesterday morning apologising for its role in plans for the league.

It said: ‘We clearly misjudged how this deal would be viewed by the wider football community and how it might impact them in the future. We will learn from this.’

JP Morgan’s work on the super league is understood to have involved several London-based bankers and was approved by the company’s internal reputation committee.

The key figures included Arsenal fan Viswas Raghavan, 54, who is the chief executive of the bank’s business in Europe.

He is believed to have been one of the major proponents of the league internally at the bank.

The Indian financier is also a lifelong devotee of cricket and was instrumental in driving its lead sponsorship of Lord’s Cricket Ground.

And Argentinian Daniel Pinto, 58, one of the co-presidents of the bank, is also believed to have signed off on the plans but is not thought to have driven the project. 

Speaking to Bloomberg Television this week, he said: ‘We were expecting this to be emotional.’

JP Morgan’s billionaire chief executive Jamie Dimon was reportedly aware of the plans but not directly involved.

A spokesperson for the bank declined to comment on individuals.

And insiders at JP Morgan insist it did not have a hand in designing the league.

A source told The Times: ‘Our job was to solve a financing problem that they wanted us to solve. We were not the architects of this transaction.’ 

It comes after mass protests against the owners of the so-called ‘big six’ English football clubs’ owners.

Last night hundreds of Arsenal fans gathered outside the Emirate Stadium in Islington, north London, to demand the club’s owner American Stan Kroenke leaves.

A review led by Tory MP Tracey Crouch will consider whether new criteria will be introduced for billionaire owners and if fans should be given greater representation at board level. 

And pundits and fans have called for the teams to face involved in the league to be deducted points as punishment.

But Leeds head coach Marcelo Bielsa said he is not in favour of the clubs being sanctioned for attempting to form the competition.

Bielsa, whose side play Manchester United on Sunday, has been highly critical of the doomed ESL plans, but feels the current system ‘is not up to standard’.

He said: ‘I don’t think that the path for a solution is for these clubs to be punished, but to convince what is best and to come up with rules of acceptance in general and make sure these rules are adhered to.

‘When a rule is broken this forces a sanction (and this) means that the process before that was not efficient.

‘And the leadership of the organisation to administer the interests of everybody is to create rules that everyone is able to adhere to as they have all accepted them.

‘I am of the opinion that punishment is more for authority and shows that the quality or the efficiency of the rules was not up to standard.’

In the wake of waves of negative reaction, United, Liverpool, Arsenal, Chelsea, Manchester City and Tottenham all swiftly confirmed they would withdraw from the process.

Newcastle head coach Steve Bruce, whose side tackle Liverpool at Anfield on Saturday, felt the ‘big six’ had ‘taken a slapping’ over the saga.

Bruce warned the football authorities would have to remain on their guard to ensure the proposal is not resurrected in the future.

‘We’ve got to guard against it because this thing must have been rumbling on for years, so we must guard against it so this threatened breakaway doesn’t happen,’ he said.

‘Look, I’ll let the authorities and the Premier League and all the rest of it deal with that, more intelligent people than I am, but they have to guard against it, that’s for sure.’

Bruce added: ‘These big clubs, how much do they need to earn? They already earn hundreds of millions more than, for example, we do and we’re a big club. It baffles me.’

Asked about his emotions as a former Red Devils captain to the Old Trafford club’s involvement in the plan, Bruce replied: ‘It’s all of them, not just Manchester United.

‘I hope they’ve learned from their mistake. They must have been all shocked with what happened so very, very quickly to shut it all down, to withdraw so quickly. Let’s hope not just Manchester United, all of them.’

The Super League clubs resigned from the European Club Association (ECA) at the weekend having announced their intention to break away.

However, a tweet from the ECA on Friday appeared to offer hope of returning to the fold.

‘We want to move past the events of this week and encourage and inspire the global football community, as matches return this weekend,’ it read.

‘Clubs can only succeed both on & off the pitch if we work hand in hand.’

The ECA has traditionally been perceived as an organisation which lobbies UEFA chiefly in the interests of Europe’s elite clubs, and failure of the Super League 12 to gain re-entry could weaken their ability to influence matters at continental level.