Uefa president Aleksander Ceferin took a dig at Real Madrid, Barcelona and Juventus for still supporting the “ill-fated” Super League, while La Liga boss Javier Tebas went to the extent of saying he would “respect” any sanctions imposed on the Big Three because of their stance on the breakaway project.

“Big clubs do not become big in isolation,” Ceferin said in a video address to the club advisory platform meeting organised by the European leagues in Madrid on Thursday.

Tebas then lashed out at the trio for treating the leagues and other clubs like “stupid, naive puppets” by their behaviour. “Their boat is half-sunk, but they want to give us lessons on how to modernise football,” he commented.

“Do they think they are cleverer than we are? The fact that they have won a lot of titles does not mean they are smarter than a lot of the leagues and a lot of the clubs in Europe... Doesn’t mean they know everything that’s going on in football.”

Tebas also questioned the “loyalty” of Fifa president Gianni Infantino, saying the latter “should not have kept secret” from Uefa and the affected competitions any meeting he had with Super League clubs.

Infantino, though, had defended himself. “To listen to some clubs and to speak with some doesn’t mean in any way whatsoever that Fifa was behind, colluding and plotting on any Super League project,” he had said.