Nasser al-Khelaifi received a series of frantic phone calls last weekend. The president of French football club Paris Saint-Germain was being pressed to sign up to a European Super League, a breakaway contest that threatened to shatter the power dynamics of the world’s favourite sport.
“It was utter chaos,” says a person with knowledge of the calls. “The lobbying went from being polite: ‘Come on guys, it’s happening,’ to switching to coercion and threats: ‘If you are not involved, you will be on your own.’”
