This has been a long time coming.

Former Premier League chief executive Richard Scudamore first raised the prospect of games overseas in 2008.

That idea would have been a ’39th game’ in addition to the normal schedule.

A decade later, US-based promoters Relevent Sports, which now manages all the global commercial rights for European football’s governing body Uefa, tried to arrange La Liga matches in the United States, and when that failed, did the same with an Ecuadorian league game.

Now the plan will become reality, as it was always likely to once Relevant reached a legal settlement with world governing body Fifa last year, which effectively gave the green light to matches overseas until new rules preventing them were drafted.

Whether fans want it to happen is another matter. Uefa might point to the “exceptional basis” on which it has agreed to these two games being moved, but “exceptional” is a flexible concept given your standpoint. Presumably there were other options available that would have meant the two matches could have been played in Spain and Italy.

The chances are legal certainty will be needed to stop further matches being moved – and that may require Fifa and Uefa to lean heavily on upholding the right of fans to see games in Europe, rather than Asia, Australia or the Americas. The European Commission will sit in judgement on this.

However, as with any legal case, nothing can be taken for granted.

Premier League chief executive Richard Masters has repeatedly stressed there are no plans to take its games overseas.

The problem is, if it proves to be a commercial success in rival leagues, and Fifa and Uefa are not successful in stopping more matches being moved, English clubs might want to do the same thing given the Premier League’s vast global reach.