We did it for African children — Real Madrid president gives bizarre reason for European Super League

Real Madrid President Florentino Pérez has made a bizarre claim regarding the spectacularly failed European Super League project, insisting that his relentless, years-long legal crusade against UEFA was genuinely fought for the benefit of impoverished youth. 

Addressing the media this evening, May 12th, Perez, as part of his explosive interview in which he launched a verbal attack against his detractors, also discussed the now-collapsed breakaway competition. 

"We WON the Super League case. We won; that's how we were able to negotiate with UEFA. What we did is for the GOOD of football. So that children in Africa can watch football for free."

Originally announced in 2021, the proposed elite tournament immediately faced overwhelming backlash from football federations, domestic leagues, and furious global fans. 

Despite Real Madrid spearheading the initiative and fighting the institutional battle all the way to the European Court of Justice, which delivered a landmark ruling on UEFA's monopoly on December 2023, the project is now completely dead in the water. 

All the founding clubs, including Real Madrid, have officially pulled out, with Los Blancos eventually negotiating a definitive exit with UEFA to end the institutional war.

Pérez’s mention of African children refers to the Super League's later, revised marketing strategy via A22 Sports, which desperately attempted to win public favour by proposing a platform that would supposedly broadcast matches for free. 

However, his statement was entirely ridiculous and in incredibly poor taste. Firstly, the Super League was inherently designed as an exclusive, closed-shop European competition meant to solely benefit a select group of the continent's wealthiest institutions. 

Secondly, the undisputed primary objective of the breakaway league was always astronomical financial gain. 

Pérez's own earlier comments from the inception of the tournament confirmed that the massive project was pushed largely out of deep financial concern, serving as a protective mechanism for traditional giants to combat the vast economic disparity created by wealthy, state-owned clubs like Manchester City and Paris Saint-Germain.

Utilising ‘African children,’ especially in such a narrative that reinforces poverty stereotypes, as a retroactive moral shield to justify a multi-billion-euro corporate power grab, is a foul redirect.