Barcelona: Charged with corruption .... again!

I think he is talking about in general terms, not just 90s United.

United was the only english team doing OK in Europe during the 90s, the likes of Newcastle, Blackburn, and Leeds were rubbish in Europe, but i doubt that was 100% due to systems or coaching, more like they just didn't have the quality of Inter, Juventus,Milan, Madrid, Barcelona, Valencia, Bayern, Dortmund, Marseille, etc.
90s PL in terms of money and quality was well behind Serie A and La Liga, and in UEFA coefficient it was behind Ligue 1 and Bundesliga as well.
But i suspect that was more due to quality rather than just coaching and systems.


Even though is undeniable that PL benefited from foreign managers later in the mid 2000s, as i highly doubt PL would dominate in modern era using just british managers.

I agree with you about the quality point, and I would add that the banning of English teams from European football for six years greatly affected the National level of clubs, both in terms of economy and in terms of inout and competition.

With regards to the poster in question, he specifically wrote that English football ‘always’ have been behind in tactical development, not ‘in the so and so period’. So it would be interesting to know how he would explain how Bill Shankly, Bob Paisley, Joe Fagan, Brian Clough and Ron Saunders/Tony Barton could monopolise the European Cup while being tactically 20 years behind their competitors.

Also, he specifically claimed United were ‘a disgrace’ in Europe before Ferguson aquired Queiroz, ignoring how Ferguson acheived a CL win, two CWC wins (one with Aberdeen!), two CL semifinals and three QF (exit to Real Madrid x2 and Bayern München) with British assistant managers.
 
I agree with you about the quality point, and I would add that the banning of English teams from European football for six years greatly affected the National level of clubs, both in terms of economy and in terms of inout and competition.

With regards to the poster in question, he specifically wrote that English football ‘always’ have been behind in tactical development, not ‘in the so and so period’. So it would be interesting to know how he would explain how Bill Shankly, Bob Paisley, Joe Fagan, Brian Clough and Ron Saunders/Tony Barton could monopolise the European Cup while being tactically 20 years behind their competitors.

Also, he specifically claimed United were ‘a disgrace’ in Europe before Ferguson aquired Queiroz, ignoring how Ferguson acheived a CL win, two CWC wins (one with Aberdeen!), two CL semifinals and three QF (exit to Real Madrid x2 and Bayern München) with British assistant managers.
For a lot of kids the world (and history) began in the 00s...
 
I mean it's patently incorrect and probably just highlights that you didn't watch any, and that your pedantic views kept you from some excellent football over the years, but your arrogant posts are pretty standard now, so whatever.
How is it incorrect?
 
Wrong.

The PL was the best league around for a good period before Pep's Barcelona kicked into gear. From 09/10 to 17 or whatever La Liga was better. But to claim that the EPl lacked IQ and technique in the 00s (and even 2010s) is laughable. Yeah footballers like Aguero, Rooney, Henry, Silva, Berbatov, Ronaldo, Lampard, Hazard, KDB, Scholes, Carrick etc were so lacking technique.
Some of them have very good technique, but that's not many.
 
Patently. I said so.
Well technically we were always quite far behind, tactically also. We were far more individual focused and relied on a "bit of brilliance" from a player. We did a good job at creating 100 half chances instead of a few good chances, we would break them down with it. As it showed it really wasn't a great way of doing things.
 
It really is. It's just plain nonsense. It's probably a projection too, as if there's a league that lacked IQ and technique in the 00s it's Bundesliga.

The Bundesliga was complete and utter garbage in the 00s but I'm not sure what this has to do with the EPL. The EPL was closer to La Liga in the 00s than between, say, 2010 to 2015 but if I'm not mistaken La Liga still lead the clear majority of years in the UEFA ranking. I think it's fair to not have the EPL as the best league in this period when there were teams like Kaka's Milan, Ronaldinho's Barcas and the Galacticos around. They're probably the most iconic teams of that era alongside United with Cristiano. After Pep took over Barca, it's pretty clear which league dominated.

And it's also a fair assessment that the EPL was aways less tactical than it's European equivalents (I don't count the Bundesliga as a elite league up until 2009 or so). I think you'll find few exprts who'll argue otherwise. It's a cultural thing, as I said. The role of the manager is sort of the embodiment of that. EPL clubs had a structural emphasis on squad building.
 
The Bundesliga was complete and utter garbage in the 00s but I'm not sure what this has to do with the EPL. The EPL was closer to La Liga in the 00s than between, say, 2010 to 2015 but if I'm not mistaken La Liga still lead the clear majority of years in the UEFA ranking. I think it's fair to not have the EPL as the best league in this period when there were teams like Kaka's Milan, Ronaldinho's Barcas and the Galacticos around. They're probably the most iconic teams of that era alongside United with Cristiano. After Pep took over Barca, it's pretty clear which league dominated.

And it's also a fair assessment that the EPL was aways less tactical than it's European equivalents (I don't count the Bundesliga as a elite league up until 2009 or so). I think you'll find few exprts who'll argue otherwise. It's a cultural thing, as I said. The role of the manager is sort of the embodiment of that. EPL clubs had a structural emphasis on squad building.

I was young back then, but i remember watching it a fair bit because our local tv-channel had the rights to Bundesliga back in those days.

I don't know if the overall quality was better then than now, probably not, but at least it wasn't boring, the league was competitive, with exciting title races and a number of different winners.

Of course, Bayern were still usually the best side, but at least they didn't walk the title every single season.
 
Some in your list were not even that good technically. Teams like Barce had technical players in nearly every position.
Which Barcleona team? Are we comparing every team/player to the best team club football has seen (in my lifetime at least) and rendering them "not good technically"? Or have you realized how daft this entire discourse is. Which of those players are not that good technically?
 
Seeing as you know the model can you explain what other top managers are likely to be Guardiola level of dominance?

No idea. There is no guarantees at the top of any industry as to who will be the best. You can only see patterns and attributes that help someone reach the top of their field. Application, attention to detail, being intelligent, working under the right people as they learn, having experience that is useful to the future direction of the space.

Its a rare individual that has all these attributes and can get other people on board with their vision. The fact its such a hard job means that plucking random players who had decent playing careers and expecting them to magically make top managers is frankly bizarre. No other industry does this. You wouldn't say to someone who worked stacking shelves at Tesco "right, we are going to send you on a years management course and then you are going to run Tesco UK at the end of it".
 
The Bundesliga was complete and utter garbage in the 00s but I'm not sure what this has to do with the EPL. The EPL was closer to La Liga in the 00s than between, say, 2010 to 2015 but if I'm not mistaken La Liga still lead the clear majority of years in the UEFA ranking. I think it's fair to not have the EPL as the best league in this period when there were teams like Kaka's Milan, Ronaldinho's Barcas and the Galacticos around. They're probably the most iconic teams of that era alongside United with Cristiano. After Pep took over Barca, it's pretty clear which league dominated.

And it's also a fair assessment that the EPL was aways less tactical than it's European equivalents (I don't count the Bundesliga as a elite league up until 2009 or so).
I think you'll find few exprts who'll argue otherwise. It's a cultural thing, as I said. The role of the manager is sort of the embodiment of that. EPL clubs had a structural emphasis on squad building.

On the first bolded, I've never been a fan of using the UEFA ranking as some absolute, it's not what it's purpose is. From 2008 to 2012 England topped the rankings every year. I disagree with that, and I'm sure you do too!

The second bolded will be subjective, we all have our own metrics for how we assess the strength of a league. But at least in terms of how I'd go about gauging it, this is a bad way. Taking a couple of individual teams from different leagues doesn't tell us much, and even less useful (to me) is the measure of how "iconic" a team is.

Overall I agree with the crux of your sentiment about the evolution of the premier league, there has been a change of approach, and while the league has always been entertaining (a subjective thing), I can understand why someone who has a particular like of a certain brand of football might find it more appealing now than they did prior.
 
Which Barcleona team? Are we comparing every team/player to the best team club football has seen (in my lifetime at least) and rendering them "not good technically"? Or have you realized how daft this entire discourse is. Which of those players are not that good technically?

I mean comparing all the lineups in general.

Lampard, Carrick, and the majority of Rooney's career
 
On the first bolded, I've never been a fan of using the UEFA ranking as some absolute, it's not what it's purpose is. From 2008 to 2012 England topped the rankings every year. I disagree with that, and I'm sure you do too!

The second bolded will be subjective, we all have our own metrics for how we assess the strength of a league. But at least in terms of how I'd go about gauging it, this is a bad way. Taking a couple of individual teams from different leagues doesn't tell us much, and even less useful (to me) is the measure of how "iconic" a team is.

Overall I agree with the crux of your sentiment about the evolution of the premier league, there has been a change of approach, and while the league has always been entertaining (a subjective thing), I can understand why someone who has a particular like of a certain brand of football might find it more appealing now than they did prior.

Your point regarding the ranking makes sense. As for the second argument, I initially spoke about the "pinnacle of football" so I thought that's a good measurement, especially in combination with the UEFA coefficient which captures the overall strength of the participating teams :) But yes, we aren't speaking of ultimate truths, personal preferences matter obviously.

Regarding the tactical dimension: For me that's a different question from the one about league quality. Tactcical adaptness is only one aspect of a team's quality. For indtance I believe most EPL teams were still better in the early 10s despite being outdated tactically but they difference in individual quality was very big. And for me, the role of the manager is a very strong argument for the EPL being less tactical. If you want to analyse the strategy an organisation is following, it makes sense to take a look at it's structure, IMO
 
I mean comparing all the lineups in general.

Lampard, Carrick, and the majority of Rooney's career
Carrick was very good technically. Lampard's technique when it came to goalscoring and end product was brilliant. Technique doesn't just mean Xavi Iniesta and you can be technically excellent without having Messi's all time great close control. Reducing such brilliant technical footballers to some mediocre technicials which they were not, is silly. Goalscoring Ronaldo (the one that barely dribbles) is technically average, or do we count the immense ball striking/heading/first touch ?
 
La Liga is shite for the moment so it's not much to judge them on...

Inevitably they would improve a lot swapping a front 3 or Memphis, Braithware and Luuk de Jong for Torres, Auba and Dembele...

His style of football was good yesterday, too early to say how good Xavi's Barcelona are going to be ultimately though. Didn't watch the Europa League game but it seems like they didn't exactly blow Galatasaray away.

Barca should have won the tie against gala like 5-1 based on xg, their finishing wasn’t quite there but they were much better then the score line suggested
 
Carrick was very good technically. Lampard's technique when it came to goalscoring and end product was brilliant. Technique doesn't just mean Xavi Iniesta and you can be technically excellent without having Messi's all time great close control. Reducing such brilliant technical footballers to some mediocre technicials which they were not, is silly. Goalscoring Ronaldo (the one that barely dribbles) is technically average, or do we count the immense ball striking/heading/first touch ?
The most important technical aspects are first touch, close control, and basic passing. The ability to control the ball, move with the ball, and pass it on in difficult situations.

I am a massive carrick fan, and hes not weak technically but hes in no way stand out. Lampard is worse, hes not great on the ball aside from a few long passes and shots. Rooney started his career with a good touch and close control, but he lost it pretty quickly and his last few seasons were very poor.
 
I was young back then, but i remember watching it a fair bit because our local tv-channel had the rights to Bundesliga back in those days.

I don't know if the overall quality was better then than now, probably not, but at least it wasn't boring, the league was competitive, with exciting title races and a number of different winners.

Of course, Bayern were still usually the best side, but at least they didn't walk the title every single season.

Yes, the title race was definitely more open :) Bayern in general were less dominant. The league was generally entertaining but it was far behind the other European top leagues. Barely any players were good enough for the EPL or La Liga to become interested. German youth development was probably at an all time low and the foreign star players of the Bundesliga usually played second fiddle in their national teams at best (Micoud, Marcelinho, Lincoln, Makaay, etc.). So it was entertaining and I get nostalgic thinking about this time but it was really, really cool when the German league was finally able to compete again when the youth reforms started kicking in and the German "pressing movement" began around 2008. And I wouldn't want to go back to that again.
 
The most important technical aspects are first touch, close control, and basic passing. The ability to control the ball, move with the ball, and pass it on in difficult situations.

I am a massive carrick fan, and hes not weak technically but hes in no way stand out. Lampard is worse, hes not great on the ball aside from a few long passes and shots. Rooney started his career with a good touch and close control, but he lost it pretty quickly and his last few seasons were very poor.
Carrick's technique was flawless, what are you even talking about? Rooney's lack of technical ability was always overblown, it was inconsistent at times but could be sublime. It got more and more inconsistent in the last years, but he's not a player who you'd characterise as "not that good technically". Really weird set of examples.
 
Carrick's technique was flawless, what are you even talking about? Rooney's lack of technical ability was always overblown, it was inconsistent at times but could be sublime. It got more and more inconsistent in the last years, but he's not a player who you'd characterise as "not that good technically". Really weird set of examples.
Carrick is my favorite United player, flawless is such a stupid thing to say. No ones technique is flawless, and Carrick's is no different, its good but not amazing at all. Berbatov's technique is way ahead of anything Carrick had.

Rooney had really poor technique in his final years, struggled to control basic passes sometimes. When he was young his touch was far far better and he moved with the ball well, not top level, but still very good.
 
The most important technical aspects are first touch, close control, and basic passing. The ability to control the ball, move with the ball, and pass it on in difficult situations.

I am a massive carrick fan, and hes not weak technically but hes in no way stand out. Lampard is worse, hes not great on the ball aside from a few long passes and shots. Rooney started his career with a good touch and close control, but he lost it pretty quickly and his last few seasons were very poor.
You state this like it's some kind of objective fact as opposed to a subjective opinion. Why doesn't shooting technique factor in here? What about heading technique? The fact is you're privileging areas that you consider more important and stating this as if it's a given.
 
You state this like it's some kind of objective fact as opposed to a subjective opinion. Why doesn't shooting technique factor in here? What about heading technique? The fact is you're privileging areas that you consider more important and stating this as if it's a given.

90% of what a footballer does on the ball is first touch, close control and basic passing. If you take averages for a midfielder, you're probably around 50 touches, 40 passes, 1 shot per game. Also, it is a zero sum game when you are very good at converting shot opportunities, yet your limitations on the ball prevent your team from creating many of those opportunities. Especially if there are players in your team who are even better at it. Shooting isn't the bread and butter of a midfielder, IMO.
 
The most important technical aspects are first touch, close control, and basic passing. The ability to control the ball, move with the ball, and pass it on in difficult situations.

I am a massive carrick fan, and hes not weak technically but hes in no way stand out. Lampard is worse, hes not great on the ball aside from a few long passes and shots. Rooney started his career with a good touch and close control, but he lost it pretty quickly and his last few seasons were very poor.
Those tend to me the attributes that draw me to a player but yours is very blinkered stance. Football matches are won and lost on more than those three aspects. I mean was RVM technically a worse footballer than someone with a killer first touch but playing in the Championship? I don't think. The sheer technique involved in being able to play football at the level he did and picking up the empty part of the net with such ease was incredible. That is part of technique. Similarly Lampard and Gerrard while not being my favorite kind of midfielder had better technique than loads of CMs with better close control. Again because there's more to football than just a few attributes. Same with the poaching version of Ronaldo - the technique it takes to finish the way he does is excellent.
 
90% of what a footballer does on the ball is first touch, close control and basic passing. If you take averages for a midfielder, you're probably around 50 touches, 40 passes, 1 shot per game. Also, it is a zero sum game when you are very good at converting shot opportunities, yet your limitations on the ball prevent your team from creating many of those opportunities. Especially if there are players in your team who are even better at it. Shooting isn't the bread and butter of a midfielder, IMO.
Yes but you're acting as if someon4 like Lampard's first touch was like Lukaku's. He was efficient as feck on the ball and won games consistently. Most managers would prefer that over Oliver Torres who people wanked themselves over only watch him do nothing.
 
I think what we've learnt here is that the PL only truly arrived when Klopp joined Liverpool and German fans found a reason to care.

Little does it matter that it was the best league around for a good period in 00s. Best to ignore that and pretend it was a nothing league pre Klopp. :wenger:
 
You state this like it's some kind of objective fact as opposed to a subjective opinion. Why doesn't shooting technique factor in here? What about heading technique? The fact is you're privileging areas that you consider more important and stating this as if it's a given.
Because they are the most core parts of football, the actions done the most, and make the biggest difference to play (for technique).
 
Yes but you're acting as if someon4 like Lampard's first touch was like Lukaku's. He was efficient as feck on the ball and won games consistently. Most managers would prefer that over Oliver Torres who people wanked themselves over only watch him do nothing.

I never acted like that.

I think what we've learnt here is that the PL only truly arrived when Klopp joined Liverpool and German fans found a reason to care.

Little does it matter that it was the best league around for a good period in 00s. Best to ignore that and pretend it was a nothing league pre Klopp. :wenger:

Nobody says it was a nothing league. But the style of football was different to other leagues. Long shots, crosses, long passes, power and pace were more popular stylistic devices than in other leagues, and I never rated tgose and still don't do to this day. And the way football has developed, it still makes sense to me. That's not the same as saying the EPL was shit.
 
Those tend to me the attributes that draw me to a player but yours is very blinkered stance. Football matches are won and lost on more than those three aspects. I mean was RVM technically a worse footballer than someone with a killer first touch but playing in the Championship? I don't think. The sheer technique involved in being able to play football at the level he did and picking up the empty part of the net with such ease was incredible. That is part of technique. Similarly Lampard and Gerrard while not being my favorite kind of midfielder had better technique than loads of CMs with better close control. Again because there's more to football than just a few attributes. Same with the poaching version of Ronaldo - the technique it takes to finish the way he does is excellent.
I just said they were the most important, not the only.

Lampard and Gerrard struggled in many top games because of their technique, shows especially for England when they did not have the technical players around them to make up for it as much. England is a perfect example of us failing in this area (among other areas).
 
I think what we've learnt here is that the PL only truly arrived when Klopp joined Liverpool and German fans found a reason to care.

Little does it matter that it was the best league around for a good period in 00s. Best to ignore that and pretend it was a nothing league pre Klopp. :wenger:

Why is it surprising?

Germany is a major Football nation, people from major nations don't get obsessed watching other leagues, same goes for english fans, the average english fan isn't invested in other leagues neither, aside from watching CL matches.

Foreign fans that support big teams come from countries with not much history in Football, like the ones you can find in the Asia continent, where before the 90s Football was amateurish.
You won't find many germans supporting english teams, and neither you will find many english supporting german teams ...but sure you will find a lot of indonesians,thais,chinese,malaysians,indians, etc supporting PL teams.

The more history/successful your league has/is, the less likely you support foreign teams or invest a lot of time watching other leagues.
 
I just said they were the most important, not the only.

Lampard and Gerrard struggled in many top games because of their technique, shows especially for England when they did not have the technical players around them to make up for it as much. England is a perfect example of us failing in this area (among other areas).
The technique was never the problem, their playing style and useless managers incapable of coming up with a cohesive lineup and balanced approach to the game was much more of a "perfect example" of why England failed. But you're coming up with some highly subjective opinions and presenting them as absolute facts across the board, so this is pretty useless.
 
The technique was never the problem, their playing style and useless managers incapable of coming up with a cohesive lineup and balanced approach to the game was much more of a "perfect example" of why England failed. But you're coming up with some highly subjective opinions and presenting them as absolute facts across the board, so this is pretty useless.
Technique was always a problem, under any pressure and they struggled to keep the ball and the basics, and we have that problem now.

Just take the Italy final, the main difference was their technique, they moved the ball so much faster than we did, which meant they countered any pressure and made space for themselves, we couldn't do that.

In terms of attacking talent our were far better than theirs, but we still struggled the whole game. Been how England have struggled my whole life anyway.
 
I think what we've learnt here is that the PL only truly arrived when Klopp joined Liverpool and German fans found a reason to care.

Little does it matter that it was the best league around for a good period in 00s. Best to ignore that and pretend it was a nothing league pre Klopp. :wenger:

To be honest the PL was very overrated from 2013-2017 so it goes both ways. I think a majority of the top 5-6 leagues are on a downturn, I still rate the epl as the highest rate now, but 4-10 in the epl isn’t anything to write home about. Even Chelsea to me are very up and down. Epl now is what la liga was in 2012 and everyone was criticizing it back then for being a two horse league even though Pep has done the same thing to the epl
 
Why is it surprising?

Germany is a major Football nation, people from major nations don't get obsessed watching other leagues, same goes for english fans, the average english fan isn't invested in other leagues neither, aside from watching CL matches.

Foreign fans that support big teams come from countries with not much history in Football, like the ones you can find in the Asia continent, where before the 90s Football was amateurish.
You won't find many germans supporting english teams, and neither you will find many english supporting german teams ...but sure you will find a lot of indonesians,thais,chinese,malaysians,indians, etc supporting PL teams.

The more history/successful your league has/is, the less likely you support foreign teams or invest a lot of time watching other leagues.

Beautifully said
 
Because they are the most core parts of football, the actions done the most, and make the biggest difference to play (for technique).
But they're all for nothing if you don't have players that can shoot and tackle. They're aesthetically the most pleasing attributes as they make players look neat, tidy and skillful, but that doesn't make them the most important technical attributes. I may be arguing devil's advocate a little but it winds me up when posters like you and @Zehner (honestly not meaning to have a personal dig at you both) play the football purist and make subjective statements about what football is as if they're objective truths.
 
No idea. There is no guarantees at the top of any industry as to who will be the best. You can only see patterns and attributes that help someone reach the top of their field. Application, attention to detail, being intelligent, working under the right people as they learn, having experience that is useful to the future direction of the space.

Its a rare individual that has all these attributes and can get other people on board with their vision. The fact its such a hard job means that plucking random players who had decent playing careers and expecting them to magically make top managers is frankly bizarre. No other industry does this. You wouldn't say to someone who worked stacking shelves at Tesco "right, we are going to send you on a years management course and then you are going to run Tesco UK at the end of it".

The reason former players get offered the job is because they easily have one part of being a good manager down without much trouble. Having the charisma to led the fans. Good managers needed to not just get the players on their side, but the fans as well. Managers that loses the fans will quickly lose the players. It's why people like Moyes failed at United. No matter how decent of a manager he was, he utterly failed to convince the fans adequately, and as a result imploded at United.

Popular players have the legacy with their fanbase that they can at the least ride out a few bad games. Ole lasted so long as United manager was all because he is considered as a legend at the club. On the other hand, it is hard for fans to buy into certain managers if they don't have a well-known playing pedigree. That will affect the players and the results.

The technique was never the problem, their playing style and useless managers incapable of coming up with a cohesive lineup and balanced approach to the game was much more of a "perfect example" of why England failed. But you're coming up with some highly subjective opinions and presenting them as absolute facts across the board, so this is pretty useless.

I'll argue it's not a question of technique, but positioning that made them flatter at national level.

What is the thing Lampard and Gerrad have in common? They were often used as CAM because they were not positionally disciplined to play a deeper role. England have no real issues with attacking players, or even attacking midfielders. England have a big problem with defensive midfielders.

Makélélé had an entire role named after him because prior to his arrival at Chelsea and in the PL, England simply do not have that many players being able of playing his role. Yes, you have plenty of tough "midfield" generals. But even them like Roy Keane (I know he's not English, but he came up from the English system) are box-to-box players rather than a real deep-lying midifielder.

How many English Deep-lying midfielders do you even find? You have Carrick and that's about it. On the other hand in other major footballing countries, you have a wider number of players who are top-level in that position. Even today, England lacks so many top players in that particular role that they had to give that position to a player who formerly spent most of his years in the championship (Kalvin Philips). And Philips isn't in any of the big 6 clubs. All the top Deep-lying midfielders at the top 6 clubs all come from foreign countries.

Even a youth player from Barca trained in that position lost all positional discipline after spending years in the PL. (Fabregas).

The problem was with the rise of Pep Guardiola and the ushering in of Spanish and modern German football, they have managed to enshrine positional play football as the most dominant system of tactic there is. But all those coaches still needed to recruit non-English players in that deep midfield role because England simply aren't producing those positionally disciplined players.

England is behind on positional play, and still is to this day. Pep and Klopp dominated the PL because many other their rivals simply can't cope with that. Burnley the most "traditional" English team in the PL, regularly gets completely destroyed by Man City because they can't cope with positional play even when they park the bus.
 
But they're all for nothing if you don't have players that can shoot and tackle. They're aesthetically the most pleasing attributes as they make players look neat, tidy and skillful, but that doesn't make them the most important technical attributes. I may be arguing devil's advocate a little but it winds me up when posters like you and @Zehner (honestly not meaning to have a personal dig at you both) play the football purist and make subjective statements about what football is as if they're objective truths.
You don't need good finishers, there are way more tap-ins than technically difficult finishes, and the better a team gets the more simple finishes they do because the rest of the football is doing the heavy lifting.
 
You don't need good finishers, there are way more tap-ins than technically difficult finishes, and the better a team gets the more simple finishes they do because the rest of the football is doing the heavy lifting.
I think we'll have to agree to disagree here. Actual tap ins are relatively few and far between. Most goals require at least some technical proficiency unless 1. they're five yards out or 2. they get a lucky deflection. The most natural finishers may make goals LOOK easy but there's a reason why commentators say things like 'thats a centre backs finish' quite often. There's also a reason that, typically, goalscorering forwards go for more money than midfielders.
 
To be honest the PL was very overrated from 2013-2017 so it goes both ways. I think a majority of the top 5-6 leagues are on a downturn, I still rate the epl as the highest rate now, but 4-10 in the epl isn’t anything to write home about. Even Chelsea to me are very up and down. Epl now is what la liga was in 2012 and everyone was criticizing it back then for being a two horse league even though Pep has done the same thing to the epl
I mean it doesn't if your rational about it. I have always championed La Liga from 09 onwards even going to 16 as the best league even when many bemoaned it being a joke league where the rest were crap. But firstly the PL has always been a league to write home about over the last few decades. Whether it's number 1 or 2, it's always been interchangeable with La Liga in cycles. To claim that an elite league which is among the two best on the planet and has been for absolute ages, is pretty silly. And to write it off as something that has only now become interesting smacks of ignorance given you know its the most popular league in the world.

There's overrating everything PL related (which Twig does and I argue against) and then there's the contingent here who to try to downplay it out of nothing but sheer bias.
 
I mean it doesn't if your rational about it. I have always championed La Liga from 09 onwards even going to 16 as the best league even when many bemoaned it being a joke league where the rest were crap. But firstly the PL has always been a league to write home about over the last few decades. Whether it's number 1 or 2, it's always been interchangeable with La Liga in cycles. To claim that an elite league which is among the two best on the planet and has been for absolute ages, is pretty silly. And to write it off as something that has only now become interesting smacks of ignorance given you know its the most popular league in the world.

There's overrating everything PL related (which Twig does and I argue against) and then there's the contingent here who to try to downplay it out of nothing but sheer bias.
I think he meant 4th to 10th placed teams currently in the EPL, otherwise his statement makes no sense at all.