UEFA's influential strategy council has come out against Michel Platini's plans to hand Champions League places to domestic cup winners, according to sources involved in the negotiations.

The sources, who did not wish to be identified, told Reuters that the council had agreed on Monday not to recommend the cup winners proposal to UEFA's executive committee.

The council did, however, agree in principle to Platini's wish of having teams from a wider range of nations involved in the competition proper.

The executive committee is set to make a final decision on the reforms when it meets in the Swiss city of Lucerne at the end of this month.

The strategy council, comprising four UEFA vice-presidents, and four representatives each for the continent's clubs, leagues and players, held a three-hour meeting with Platini on Monday.

The majority of council members left the discussions without answering journalists' questions and UEFA said there would be no detailed statement following the talks.

"All parties that were represented agreed that it would not be appropriate to comment in detail in terms of the outcome of the meeting," UEFA general secretary David Taylor told reporters.

"We've made excellent progress and the decision will be made plain after the executive committee meeting on November 30."

Platini successfully campaigned for the UEFA presidency in January with a pledge to open up the Champions League to clubs from less powerful footballing nations.

He initially suggested UEFA could remove one of the four qualifying places currently awarded to teams from the three highest-ranking countries.

When that idea met with resistance, the former French international came up with proposals to hold two separate qualifying competitions.

The first would involve domestic cup winners from the 16 top associations battling for four Champions League places while the second would have national champions from the bottom 40 nations playing each other for six Champions League spots.

Both the cup winners idea and the proposal to hold two separate qualifying competitions have been strongly opposed by the continent's top clubs and leagues.

Monday's strategy council meeting now appears to have ended any chance of cup winners entering the Champions League, leaving the executive committee to vote on Platini's overall plan to ease the path of smaller clubs into the competition.

(China Daily via Agencies November 14, 2007)