By Francis Onyach - Reporter
23 November 2025 - Florentino Pérez’s reported remarks tap into one of football’s biggest tensions: who really benefits from the modern game’s money fans, players and clubs, or governing bodies and executives.
Using his praise of FIFA and criticism of UEFA and La Liga as a springboard, these comments open a broader debate about free access to football, salary inflation at the top of the sport, and governance models that appear increasingly out of step with fans’ interests.
Pérez’s central claim is that fans should be able to watch football for free, positioning this as both a moral argument and a strategic vision for the sport’s future.
Broadcasting has become the dominant revenue stream in elite football, with domestic and international TV deals determining club budgets and competitive balance, which in turn has pushed ticketing and subscription costs steadily upward for ordinary supporters.
The idea of universally free-to-air football challenges that business model and instead imagines a system where global reach, sponsorship and technology replace paywalls as the main drivers of income.
The Club World Cup example
Pérez’s thanks to FIFA over the Club World Cup reflect his view that the revamped tournament, with broad free access in many territories, represents a step toward this “football for all” model.
In his public comments, he has framed the competition as a breakthrough made possible by technology, stressing that children around the world being able to watch Real Madrid at no cost aligns with football’s global and social role.
At the same time, the expanded Club World Cup also carries huge prize money for clubs, showing that “free to watch” does not necessarily mean “less lucrative” for participants, but rather a different route to monetisation.
When Pérez accuses UEFA of resisting free access to preserve “huge salaries”, he is reviving a long-running conflict between major clubs and European football’s governing body.
For years, he has argued that UEFA operates as a monopoly, extracting value from elite clubs through centralised control of the Champions League while keeping decision-making and financial upside in the hands of a relatively small executive class.
The European Super League project, with its promises of more predictable revenues for top clubs and, in some versions, wider free-to-air distribution, was part of that challenge, even if it provoked fierce backlash from fans who feared a closed, anti-competitive system.
Executive Pay and La Liga Comparison
Pérez’s swipe at the La Liga president, whose salary has been widely reported as higher than that of the Premier League chief despite La Liga generating significantly less commercial revenue, is designed to highlight what he sees as a misalignment between performance and pay in football governance.
The Premier League is generally recognised as the most profitable and globally marketable domestic league, yet Spain’s league leadership has often been criticised by big clubs like Real Madrid and Barcelona for decisions on TV rights, match scheduling and commercial strategy.
Taken together, these comments are less about a single competition and more about who controls football’s future and how its wealth is shared.
One vision, which Pérez champions, leans on global free access, direct relationships between major clubs and fans, and a rebalancing of power away from traditional governing bodies.
The other defends the existing pyramid, central regulation and established revenue distribution, even if that means ongoing reliance on Pay-TV and subscription platforms.
