Football: European clubs to generate pounds 375m jackpot

TELEVISION AND marketing rights for the new-look European club competitions will generate pounds 375m, and bonuses will be paid based on results for the 32 clubs engaged in the Champions' League.

A further pounds 130m is to be distributed on the basis of each club's ability to generate funds by television rights. Uefa calculated that on this basis, a club with the best pulling power which has won all its matches could scoop up to pounds 32.5m.

Uefa also confirmed yesterday that the European Cup-Winners' Cup would not take place after this season, with the revamped Champions' League and Uefa Cup launched next year. The 32-team Champions' Cup has been introduced in a bid to offset the possible setting-up of a European Super League.

Uefa said it was determined not to repeat the mistakes that blighted the ticketing arrangements for this summer's World Cup finals. Guido Tognoni, the head of Uefa's National Teams Department, said: "The ticket allocation will ensure that a third of every stadium will be filled with the fans of the competing teams.

"At least 16 per cent of all tickets will go to the competing teams, but when any other country plays against the hosts Belgium or the Netherlands, the fans of the opposing country will receive 20 per cent of the tickets."

Tognoni added that there will be a maximum allocation of four tickets per applicant and that the sale of tickets to corporate organisations will be kept to a realistic minimum.