Local and regional rivalries are at the heart of the passion amongst fan bases, nothing intensifies a soccer match more than the cultural aspects that surround it.
With this in mind the Royal League was formed in 2004, a club tournament for Scandinavia. The idea doesn't seem bad, in reality it seems like it was something that should've had a lot of popularity, but the execution is what killed it.
Denmark, Sweden and Norway each sent four participants, they were divided into 3 groups and then a knock-out stage would follow, the whole tournament had home and away matches. Furthermore, the Royal League was held in the winter, between November and April approximately, which was during the off-season for Norway and Sweden and mid-season for Denmark.
Because of the amount of games and time of year in which the tournament was held, the local rivalries were not enough to make the clubs take the Royal League seriously. The Norwegian and Swedish clubs gave their main players the vacation they deserved and fielded a reserve team. The Danish teams did the same because they always felt like the local league, that took place simultaneously, took priority. This was the main factor that kept both fans and sponsors from fulling investing in the project.
After three underwhelming editions of the tournament it was clear that something had to change. There were talks of increasing the prize money, and even expanding the Royal League with clubs from Finland and Iceland. Unfortunately before a fourth edition could be held, and any of these changes could be applied, it was announced that they were unable to sell the TV rights and the Royal League was scrapped once and for all.
There have been rumors and behind the scenes talks about reviving the Royal League, but nothing concrete. With European soccer becoming constantly more exclusive to the rich few, regional tournaments could be a great way to maintain the glory of historic yet underrecognized clubs.