Copenhagen, Denmark - FIFA President Gianni Infantino found himself in the sights of UEFA Chief Aleksander Ceferin on Tuesday, who declared "football has no need for emperors."

"Yes, let's grow, let's innovate, let's make our clubs and competitions even more successful, but let's never forget that football is bigger than those who govern it," Ceferin, the leader of European football's governing body, told the European Football Clubs general assembly in Copenhagen.

"We are custodians, we are not owners. Nobody has the right to sell its future," he said.

UEFA, whose clubs and national teams dominate football's global economy, has been outspoken in its opposition to Infantino ever since it emerged in late July that FIFA was aiming to create a commercial subsidiary called FIFA Forward Enterprise to run its biggest events, such as the World Cup and Club World Cup.

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It said it would consider boycotting FIFA-organized tournaments before suspending that threat after receiving written assurances in late August that world football's governing body would not try to revive the plans to sell stakes to private investors.

UEFA has also gone to a court in Florida in an attempt to access documents related to Infantino's failed plan with the aim of gathering evidence for a potential criminal complaint in Switzerland, where both UEFA and FIFA are based.

Ceferin used his address to liken Infantino to the emperor in the Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale "The Emperor's New Clothes."

"We all know the story. An emperor is persuaded that he is wearing magnificent clothes, clothes which he thought only the foolish or unfit could not see," Ceferin said.

"His court goes along with it until a child says aloud what everyone can see – the emperor is naked," he continued. "Perhaps the moral of this story is that convenient words cannot change uncomfortable realities."