La Liga boss labels Man City, PSG 'playthings of the state'

LONDON - Manchester City and Paris Saint-Germain should be excluded from European club competition and are nothing more than "playthings of the state", La Liga's president Javier Tebas said on Wednesday.

It is not the first time the outspoken head of the Spanish league has attacked Abu Dhabi-owned City or Qatari-owned PSG, and newly crowned Premier League champion City has threatened to take him to court.

Tebas launched another broadside at the wealthy clubs when he spoke at the Financial Times Business of Football Summit, saying City and PSG "are clubs who could not care less what their real incomes are when they want to sign a player because they receive income from the state".

"It forces other clubs into an economic situation which is really living on the edge. It skews the balance of the entire European football structure," Tebas said.

"This is no longer sport. This is no longer an industry. It becomes more like a toy, a plaything of the state.

"And when it's a plaything, kids start playing with other kids. You end up ruining the entire system."

City - which last weekend completed a historic domestic treble with a 6-0 whipping of Watford in the FA Cup final - is presently under investigation by UEFA for alleged breaches of its Financial Fair Play (FFP) rules. The club strongly denies any wrongdoing.

PSG was able to pay a world record fee of $248 million for Neymar in 2017 and also signed French striker Kylian Mbappe the same summer.

The 56-year-old Costa Rica-born Tebas, who has been in his present role since 2013, said the way in which City and PSG spent freely in the transfer market had an effect on rivals.

He said other clubs see a European Super League, a potential replacement for the Champions League that Tebas opposes, as enriching them and making them better able to compete on a more level playing field.

"The origin of this entire problem with the Super League is the inflationary effect that Manchester City and PSG have created across the whole of Europe," said Tebas.

"The rest of the clubs in Europe want money to compete with these guys."

Agence France-Presse