Probably. But they have been for years so I can see 'the brand' being continued by their respective cities.
I'd come round to the ESL idea. I know some of the proposal wasn't too palatable but it was the first statement on the table. Some things can be negotiated, and the authorities went straight into "NO NO NO" mode, when I'd have preferred them to look for advantages they could have got from it. The 'no relegation' thing - wouldn't want that but in Argentina I believe there's a (I'm a bit sketchy on the precise details as I can't be bothered looking them up - I know enough for a broad-brush view) competition where big clubs can only be relegated on an average of about 3 seasons results, so relegation is near-impossible...unless the club is truly harpooned in which case they will eventually disappear and be replaced. The major Euro clubs might have negotiated in that direction to keep them, and some of the money this ESL would have made, onside.  I prob took the 'potentially in favour of it....' view partly because the strong opposition to it came from organisations which have been caught on the fiddle themselves in the past, so were happy enough to syphon off some football money into their own pockets but were outraged at the thought of anyone else ring-fencing some of it for themselves.
In the breakaway's shoes I think I'd now be looking at the threat they received - that the clubs involved might not have been able to play in their national competitions - an empty threat imho as what would the EPL's TV income be if their biggest matches were eg Sheff U v Southampton - and recognising that they'd need more than a mid-week league, they'd in fact need a number of competitions so I'd chat to more clubs for 2 divisions of Euro league, and to clubs around the world for a cup competition, and look into setting up a full separate bigger-money (as it would be if it didn't have the minnows to also chuck some token coins to each season) alternative football setup.

HC wrote:

Friggin disgrace. Sick of fitba being about nothing but money.

Yep. But it is HC, at your club and mine. Until fitba can be less about money we need to make it better it as it is, so to me the realpolitik would be changing a number of current things. Included is the SFA and SPFL, and removing the big guns from England would weaken the english leagues and their bank balances. Maybe they'd then take on more young Scottish players as a result, maybe the TV money wouldn't go quite so much to them and we'd get a better cut, maybe there'd be cross-border competitions and the resulting income would help us.