Lyon president Jean-Michel Aulas has called for Ligue 1 to be reduced to an 18-team league in a bid to help French clubs' floundering European challenge.
Following a string of underwhelming displays, notably in the Europa League, from French clubs in European competition in recent seasons, France has slipped to seventh place in UEFA's coefficient rankings.
As a consequence, they risk seeing their Champions League allocation reduced from three places to two with only the league winners guaranteed a group stage berth.
Aulas, 65, told OLTV the answer to improving the situation is in reversing the decision to increase the size of France's top tier from 18 to 20 clubs in 2002/03.
"You have to give French clubs the means to be competitive in Europe," said Aulas, whose own club missed out on the Europa League group stage as they suffered a surprise defeat at the hands of unheralded Romanian club Astra earlier this season.
"We have clearly seen in recent years the energy used in midweek during European games. With the changes to the fixture list, which mean we can't play after Sunday, it causes a number of problems. We need fewer clubs in the professional divisions."