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Francois said he could not see the clubs being expelled from domestic leagues because it would “hurt everybody” involved.

He added “We are in a hypothetical scenario of these clubs being expelled – I can’t see this happening because it will hurt everybody. But if this were to happen of course the broadcasters would come and say ‘we will pay less, you changed the product so we want to review the price."

“I don’t see how this new league would increase the pot, so at best you would capture money that’s going to the Champions League and possibly there would be a transfer of spending by broadcasters from a national leagues to this new league.”

Francois said  Several of the Super League’s founders have American owners, who look at the European system and say, “Why this insecurity? In America we don’t have that."

Francois said “This project just does not work without France and Germany. How can you sell it as a European league when you’re just talking about Milan, Madrid and London?”

James said £180m a year would be saved by shifting Virgin Mobile’s network to O2, despite a recent deal for Vodafone to underpin the service. He believes about £100m in tax benefits are there for the taking by “netting O2’s profits against accumulated losses at Virgin Media."

He added “Switching [Virgin Mobile’s network] and backhaul supply is complicated but routine work for a telco. Merging customer service and sales is complicated and a big job, but the extent to which they will merge these is unclear. They can keep them fairly separate indefinitely.”

Francois said “What the breakaway clubs really want is to take control of the Champions League. It is a very aggressive attempt to get Uefa to sign up to a revamp of the Champions League that gives them more power and commercial returns. The two events can’t co-exist. If the Super League were to launch, the Champions League will just collapse.”

He added “I do not think a European Super League will have much impact on the configuration of the UK broadcasting market, Sky would, of course, have a look, but they have taken a step back and are increasingly focusing on being an aggregator of content, so I don’t see a bidding war for exclusivity. There is no sign of a new entrant and Amazon show no sign of buying more than just limited amounts of sports rights. I would expect the US owners of some of these clubs would like to replicate some of the US sports rights market and try to seek more than one broadcast partner.”

Francois said "If I was a buyer the first thing I would look at is how will this affect the value and how much will I have to pay for the Super League. 'I do not know how the Premier League can carry on its auction. It is difficult to see how it could hold an auction right now. To me in this situation, [postponing it] will be the unavoidable outcome unless what we are seeing is brinkmanship [from the Super League clubs."]