Europe’s top clubs have scuppered FIFA boss Gianni Infantino’s hopes of launching a revamped Club World Cup in 2021 by telling him they will not take part in the competition.

The stark message comes in a letter to UEFA president Aleksander Ceferin from the European Club Association, which represents 232 of the continent’s leading teams, and was sent via email on Tuesday, three days before a crucial meeting of FIFA’s ruling council in Miami on Friday.

The letter, which Press Association Sport has seen, reminds Ceferin that the ECA “is unwilling to consider any new or significantly revised competition prior to a holistic assessment” of the international match calendar, which has been agreed until 2024.

Ceferin, however, did not really need reminding of this as he and the ECA are in complete agreement in their anger at how Infantino has gone about this attempt to rewrite the football calendar.

But this letter will enable the Slovenian, who is also a FIFA vice-president, to tell FIFA that there can be no new money-spinner in 2021 without the game’s biggest stars.

Copy provided by Press Association Sport