On 4 June, former UEFA president Johansson passed away at the age of 89. This is a figure of epochal significance to football and the one who has changed the fate of clubs in European countries the most. Mr. Johansson is not a politician in the traditional sense, but his love for football is unquestionable, and his contribution to football is the most profound. As we mourn the death of Mr. Johansson, it seems that we are compelled to mention several major events in his life. Today, let us calm down our deep feelings and walk into the legendary life of Lennart Johansson.
The death of Lennart Johansson seems to be a major earthquake in world football, but in the Chinese media, this unfortunate news does not seem to set off any waves. Today, it is necessary to recall his great contribution to world football, the Swedish old man who has been in power of UEFA for 17 years, who has worked hard to push European football to the commanding heights of the world, his people and his life's struggle behind it.
1. The Swede who became the president of UEFA
"Swedish football ushered in a sad moment, and Johansson sadly passed away. Johansson, 89, died of illness on the evening of June 4. —Official website of the Swedish Football Association
Born in Stockholm, Sweden, in 1929, Lennart Johansson never had a career, becoming the director of football at the age of 34 at the age of 34 and then rising all the way to the club's president. In 1979, at the age of 50, Johansson became president of the Swedish League; in 1984, he was promoted to president of the Swedish Football Association.
In 1988, Johansson became the executive committee of UEFA, and the 58-year-old Johnson officially entered UEFA. Two years later, after defeating Roumo by 5 votes, Johansson successfully took over as UEFA president at the UEFA general assembly, and was also the fifth president of UEFA.
Johansson, who has entered the flower armor, stands at the core stage of world football, but at that time, the president of UEFA was definitely not a "fat job". At that time, turbulent Europe was experiencing a series of events such as the collapse of the Soviet Union, the merger of East and West Germany, the Balkan conflict, and the rapid development of the cable TV industry, which made UEFA face challenges in all aspects.
Difficulties mean opportunities, and europe under the drastic changes has become the best stage to prove Johansson's personal ability, under his leadership, UEFA member states have increased significantly, and UEFA's income has also been greatly improved. It was also at this time that Johansson decided to implement his life's greatest ambition, a plan to completely change the landscape of European football.
2. European war reform and farewell to the three major cups
Before 1992, the "UEFA Champions League" was also called the "European Club Champions Cup", which was simply a tournament in which only the champion teams of UEFA member states could participate. The parallel "European Cup Winners' Cup" is also a competition in which only the champions of the national cups can participate, and if a team wins both the league championship in its own country and the cup in its own country, it will automatically give up the "European Cup Winners' Cup" place. At the same time, the UEFA Cup brings together the second group of teams from all UEFA member states. In an era when the three major cups are juxtaposed, European football has given professional football a long lead in the position of the world's number one sport.
But Johansson is determined to change all this, he hopes that European football can become the absolute core, the strength is far beyond South American football, and Johansson's first knife is on the "European Club Champions Cup". In the 1991/92 season, the "European Club Champions Cup", which was previously a pure knockout round, was set up in the group stage at 8-4. A year later, the tournament was officially renamed the "UEFA Champions League". In a few casual years, Johansson refined the group format of the World Cup, and a model called the "group round robin format" became the group stage of the Champions League, which gave all participating clubs more opportunities to show themselves to the world. Immediately after, the "UEFA Champions League" was expanded from 16 to 24 teams, and the format became a more complex "double-layer group round robin format", and the participating teams were no longer limited to the league champions of various countries and last season's Champions League, and the runners-up of the higher leagues could also participate.
The restructured Champions League matches are generally held on Tuesday and Wednesday nights, which also directly limits the limit of broadcast resources. Johansson, after completing the successful reform of the "Champions League", is not satisfied with this, he hopes that the Champions League can get higher authority. On this basis, Johansson did not hesitate to sacrifice the "European Cup winners's Cup", which also directly affected the talent training system of European football.
In the 1999/00 season, Johansson merged the European Cup winners' Cup, one of the three major European Cups, into the European Cup, and the champions of the national cups, who were supposed to represent their country in the European Cup of Winners, were given tickets to the European Cup. At the same time, teams eliminated from the third round of the Champions League qualifiers, as well as the third place in each group of the Champions League group stage, are also given the opportunity to participate in the League Cup, which is directly in the knockout stage.
Finally, at the beginning of the century, the Champions League achieved the goal of 32 participating teams, and the number of teams in the UEFA Cup has also increased significantly. From the perspective of business operation, Johnson is successful, but he broke the tradition and also laid hidden dangers for his future. From the perspective of pure football, Johnsson's approach is too idealistic, and the "three major European cups" that once performed their respective duties have balanced the power of major leagues and allowed young players to have more relaxed room for growth. In the early days of Johansson's tenure, he did create the unprecedented glory of the "Three European Cups", and in the 90s alone, 10 times the World Footballer of the Year came from the "UEFA Cup" 5 times. When all resources are concentrated in the Champions League, the high degree of commercialization has completely upset the balance, it is difficult for small teams to rise, and non-traditional football powers rarely produce superstars.
Johnsson's most successful early years in office was his ability to maintain a balance between the big club and the average team. For example, Johansson expanded the European Championship from 8 to 16 teams, which directly increased the impact of the cup. But what forced Johansson to continue to ramp up reforms after 1996 was his competitive relationship with Blatter.
Until 2003, the Champions League carried out a second reform, all the interests are deepening, the emergence of monopoly interests, the strong impact of the G14 organization, which means a change in the order of football. The football world of the 1980s and 1990s, which once blossomed with flowers, never returned, and football shifted from the "era of the three cups" to the era of the Champions League's solipsism. The "second restructuring" of the Champions League has safeguarded the interests of the top powers, and Platini has also won more votes for himself to compete for the UEFA presidency in the future by absorbing more countries to qualify for the Champions League.
It can even be said that at the end of Johansson's tenure, he had lost control of UEFA.
3. The Bosman Act and secondary reforms
At the same time as Johnsson, there was also an inconspicuous little player, who was later the famous Bosman. They also stepped onto the highest stage in Europe in 1990, with very different fates, but he was the name that Johansson could not avoid in his life.
In 1990, a Belgian player named Bosman, dissatisfied with the team's salary, decided not to renew his contract with RFC Liege after the contract expired, trying to transfer to the French club Dunkirk. But at the time, players whose contracts expired still required a transfer fee, and Dunkirk refused to pay the transfer fee. Bosman was forced to stay at the club. In July 1990, Bosman, who still refused to sign with THE RFC Liège, was punished by the club for "being unpaid and not playing for any team other than the RFC Liege" in accordance with the rules of the Belgian Football Association. With no contract still being blocked by the club, Bosman decided to defend his interests.
As a result, Bosman took the RFC Liège, the Belgian Football Association and UEFA to the court, demanding $1 million in compensation. Bosman, who used the Treaty of Rome as his basis, opened a five-year lawsuit, and the players did not hesitate to fall into the "field court". Although Bosman has won two lawsuits, he has repeatedly fallen into unemployment and has almost missed his professional time. Four years after RFC Liège, the Belgian Football Federation and UEFA appealed against the verdict, the Belgian Supreme Court ruled to reject the above. Unconvinced, UEFA took a two-pronged approach, on the one hand, to put pressure on the EU Council of Ministers, hoping that they could help UEFA maintain its management of the players; on the other hand, UEFA expressed its sincerity to Bosman in reconciliation, proposing to pay 8 million francs.
This independent war against UEFA has made Bosman a global news figure. Bosman, who enjoyed wide public support, raised the lawsuit to the European Court of Justice. Bosman, who withstood the pressure, finally survived until December 15, 1995, when the European Court of Justice finally ruled that "the current transfer fee system and the limit on foreign aid quotas are illegal", which is the famous Bosman Act. On February 19, 1996, the act came into force.
After the implementation of the bill, Johansson's UEFA control over European clubs has dropped significantly, and the Pandora's box of professional player transfer markets has been officially opened. It was precisely to prevent the major clubs from establishing the European Super League that Johansson was forced to carry out the biggest ever reform of the three major European cups - the "European Cup of Winners" into the "UEFA Cup". When FIFA also focuses on the European arena, is this bowl of soup enough? All the influence that Bosque has brought will benefit all players trapped in the transfer, but it will not be conducive to Johansson's ideal blueprint. When agents drive players to do everything they can to make things difficult for the club, the agents that John loosely calls "those who should be on the gallows" are the demons released by The Pandora box that Bosman opened.
More and more non-European players are pouring into Europe, sharing the fruits of European youth training, but also compressing the growth space of European children. The Bosman Act is a matter of clear advantages and disadvantages, and it is also an inevitable event under the highly commercial development of European football, and the reformed "European Union Cup" will eventually become a "chicken rib", which Is johnsson can foresee, but even so, he still has no remorse.
At the same time as this major measure, Johansson also announced his candidacy for FIFA presidency, which also laid the groundwork for the subsequent defeat against Blatter. However, the side of Johnsson's failure has nothing to do with his contribution to football, and perhaps this is the saddest part.
4. The war with FIFA and Blatter
During his presidency of UEFA, Johansson held democracy, transparency and cooperation until the Bosman Act, which created a clash of ideas between him and then FIFA president Blatter. In 1998, in the FIFA presidency campaign, Johansson finally received 80 votes, losing by a margin of 31 votes.
Many years later, Johnson said: "The reason I lost was because they bought the ballot. FIFA is a terrible mess, and to people, FIFA is a symbol of corruption and bribery. ”
What exactly happened in the FIFA presidency? We don't know, but one thing is certain: Blatter has torn Europe apart. As the most influential and wealthy league in world football, UEFA controls the most valuable "Champions League" and also manages all the giants of the five major leagues. But even so, the European countries could not join forces to support one person against Blatter, and the election of Figo and Prince Ali a few years later illustrated the problem. In 1998, Johansson was the president of UEFA, and he did not get all the votes from Europe. A few years later, the UEFA congress was held in Johansson's native Sweden, and the last UEFA president was not Johansson's right and left hand, nor Norwegian Omadar, but Platini, who was still a friend of Blatter's at the time. At that time, Johansson was furious and predicted that UEFA would eventually "lose power" and that Blatter would control FIFA for a long time.
Everything Johansson said at the time became a reality. Although Europe still held 15 places at the beginning of the 32-team expansion of the World Cup in France in 1998, after 2006, the Number of World Cup places in European countries was gradually reduced to 13, and Blatter did not fulfill his promise, but continued to hold the fifa president position through votes from other continents. Among them is the claim that Blatter "won in Africa" and the inexplicable scandal between Blatter and South Korean Jung Mong-joon, who represents FIFA vice president representing Asia.
As early as the Avilange era, Blatter served as secretary general of FIFA for four years, so he was given the opportunity to get close to all national associations around the world and practiced his skills. Grasping the objective conditions under which FIFA and UEFA would be difficult to part ways, Blatter had a way to defeat Johansson once and for all.
Despite Johansson's unsuccessful bid for FIFA presidency, he is still the most powerful UEFA president and still poses a great threat to Blatter. In 2001, when Blatter was mired in a bribery scandal over the ISL/ISMM bankruptcy, Johansson raised 25 questions. At the UEFA Executive Board, the members accepted Blatter's explanation of the "25 questions", and Blatter once again narrowly won. Johansson was later diagnosed with prostate cancer. In 2007, Platini defeated Johansson by 27-23 votes to elect UEFA's sixth president, after losing four consecutive terms to Platini, who was fully supported by Blatter. After Platini was elected, he proposed Johansson as honorary president of UEFA, and the meeting was adopted by acclamation, and a generation of European football leaders bid farewell with tears.
But the contradictions between Johansson and FIFA are by no means due to Blatter's tenure. As early as when Brent was not the former FIFA president Avilange's "little follower", the contradiction had already erupted. In the 1994 United States World Cup draw ceremony was held in las Vegas, the tournament organizing committee invited the king of the ball Pele to participate, but before Pele walked into the venue, Avelaange issued an "eviction order" to prohibit Pele from participating. The reason for this was a business dispute between Pele and Avillange's son-in-law, Sherat, then president of the Brazilian Football Association. Although many of the key players in football who were present at the time came forward to intercede, Avillange did not regret it at that time.
In Johnsson's eyes, it is giants such as Pele and Beckenbauer that have given rise to today's football career. At the same time, as the vice president of FIFA, Johansson could not stand the "one-word" that no one in the eyes of the FIFA president, so there was a subsequent competition. Out of respect for the deceased, the story of The struggle between Johansson and Avyrange is not mentioned here.
In 2007, Johansson was inducted into the Swedish Football Hall of Fame and is also known as the "Father of the Champions League". For this poignant news, FIFA President Infantino also issued a eulogy on FIFA's official website: "We are very sad about the death of Leonard Johansson, who is our friend and a valuable source of inspiration and wisdom. When I joined UEFA in 2000, he helped me and I am forever grateful for that. Leonard has always been our professional role model, and more importantly his personality. "To show respect and respect for Johansson, UEFA has decided to hold a ceremony of silence at all UEFA Nations League, qualifying and UEFA U21 matches held this week.
"As a visionary leader and architect of the Champions League, he will always be remembered for his contribution to this wonderful event and world football will always be grateful to him." The current president of UEFA , Cheferin.