Gary Neville continued his verbal assault against those that were behind the Super League plans, saying that they have raised an 'army' against them after their 'attempted murder' of English football.
Neville told Sky Sports that government intervention was needed to reclaim the largest football clubs from those who would look to undermine the structures of the football pyramid.
"I don't think we mind money in the game. We don't mind it, we've benefited from it. But the idea that you take away fair and equal competition, the idea that it's a closed shop and that [the likes of] Leicester finish in the Champions League, but they can't play in the Super League - it is despicable.
"It was an attack on Leeds United, it was an attack on Everton, West Ham, Newcastle United - some of the greatest clubs in the history of English football."
Gary Neville
🗣 "We're going to have to take it off them, and the only people who can do that are the government."@GNev2 calls for the government to step in to take the power of the clubs away from the owners pic.twitter.com/TWBoCprmq5
— Football Daily (@footballdaily) April 25, 2021
Neville spoke of the exclusion of the bigger clubs in European football and how it showed Super League to be a naked cash grab.
"What about Ajax, PSV Eindhoven, Feyenoord - these are unbelievable clubs. They were just left, with basically the pennies while the rich just went away and took their £300m every year for 23 years and created their own league?
"The scariest thing is that these people are regrouping back at base. This is their second attempt in eight months. 'Big Picture' was an attempt to change the '14 and 6' voting model, that is the sacrosanct thing in this country that holds it together. That is where the clubs last week probably thought 'we're not going to have a problem here.'
"They tried to change that with 'Big Picture', they've now come back with a second proposal. They'll come back with a third. They have to be stopped. They've obviously animated number 10 Downing Street, they've animated politicians, they've animated Royal Family, they've animated every single football fan in this country.
"They've got their work cut out because they've got an army against them."
Solskjaer
Neville also had extremely pointed comments on Ole Gunnar Solskjaer's comments following the drama earlier this week.
"I love Ole to bits [...] but this is far bigger than Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and he would accept that. Manchester United fans last week were fighting for their lives to stay in their own competition.
"This is far bigger than any individual that has a job at that football club. Everybody that plays, knows, and loves football knows that this was wrong. I called them impostors. The ultimate long game is to get the owners out of [United] but the short-term has to be some protections put in place to ensure they cannot be allowed to do what they want with English football.
"They want to take it away. They want to maximise their revenues at the expense of football fans and of fair and equal competition in England. That cannot happen. Ole will either keep his job through good results or not keep his job with results.
"It was severe language, but last week was an attempted murder on football, and sorry doesn't wash. It's gone past sorry because it's twice that you've done it. You've already done it the first time with 'Big Picture', if you were sorry then you wouldn't have brought back this one."
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