La Liga - 2014/15

Worst performance from a defence ever.

Messi and Ronaldo are no doubt the best two players on the planet, but you could place any PL mediocre striker in a Barca/Madrid side and they'd become one of the best forwards on the planet.

I'm still waiting for Chicharito to score.
 
So Ronaldo has scored more in this game than Falcao has all season then.
 
Thank feck I switched after Bale's goal because as I predicted, the match would be boring and tedious.happy Easter errbody
 
Messi and Ronaldo are no doubt the best two players on the planet, but you could place any PL mediocre striker in a Barca/Madrid side and they'd become one of the best forwards on the planet.
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I'm not saying they couldn't, but my point is more re the state of the Spanish league as opposed to the quality of the top 2 and how good they'd be elsewhere.

I mean - look at that last goal from Ronaldo and look at the defending. Look at the defending of both of Benzema's goals. It's laughable. To me at least, this isn't watching football - it's a turkey shoot. Any professional team conceding 9 goals in a game should be having a serious look at themselves.
I agree with that,they should have showed more pride.About the tv rights,maybe they can give more money to other teams but not in the P.L proportion,almost equal for everybody.At least I don't want a N.B.A competion
 
The "so what" part of your post is what I'm trying to get to here. It's quite important - maybe not so much if you're a Madrid or Barca fan, or someone tuning in just to see some goals and be entertained, but for anyone that gives even a casual feck about the state of any club outside the top 5 or so, it's quite important.

Have Spain sorted out their TV rights stuff yet? Now that games are stretched from morning to night, is there more money for clubs outside the top 2?

The so what was meant at the futility of using goals to measure performance. A team could lose 5-0 but have played quite well and very evenly matched in number of chances, possession, etc., just having been unlucky to concede on every shot by their opponent. Of course this performance from Granada was atrocious, one of the worst that I can remember in recent times, but it's quite clearly an outlier.

In the end this doesn't change much in terms of competitiveness, whether Granada had played similarly bad and only lost 3-0 would that have made it somehow a more competitive match? In those terms there have been plenty of worse teams in the PL in the previous decade... Sunderland 05/06, Watford, Wolves, Wigan, and the worst of all, Derby in 07/08.
 
I agree with that,they should have showed more pride.About the tv rights,maybe they can give more money to other teams but not in the P.L proportion,almost equal for everybody.At least I don't want a N.B.A competion

Why not?
 
The so what was meant at the futility of using goals to measure performance. A team could lose 5-0 but have played quite well and very evenly matched in number of chances, possession, etc., just having been unlucky to concede on every shot by their opponent. Of course this performance from Granada was atrocious, one of the worst that I can remember in recent times, but it's quite clearly an outlier.

In the end this doesn't change much in terms of competitiveness, whether Granada had played similarly bad and only lost 3-0 would that have made it somehow a more competitive match? In those terms there have been plenty of worse teams in the PL in the previous decade... Sunderland 05/06, Watford, Wolves, Wigan, and the worst of all, Derby in 07/08.

You're missing the point. I'm not talking about Real/Barca compared to Chelsea, or Granada compared to Leicester or QPR. I'm talking about the competition itself. If Madrid and Barca are scoring 5 or more in a quarter of all their games in a season, and winning the majority of all of their other games fairly comfortably too, then the competition structure needs to be reviewed at the very least. The gulf in class is just too much, fans will turn away.

It seems silly when the current champions are Atletico, and when Valencia in particular are having a bit of a renaissance, but the gap from top to bottom is huge in Spain, way bigger than any other major league, and is only widening. I fear that it's not sustainable.
 

I think he means that realistically that won't happen because if they do then RM and Barça would rake in less tv money than QPR and Burnley. They are in the process of restructuring it, but so much depends on how much they can sell the rights for. PL's new record deal has made it extremely difficult in that respect.
 

Barca and Real Madrid would still dwarf the other Liga clubs, but would be less competitive compared to the other European giants. Meanwhile clubs like Atletico, Valencia and Athletic, the top competition in other words, would have less money than they do now.
 
Fair enough, I'm not up to speed with the specifics of numbers and all that. I just thought the comment re not wanting an NBA system was looking exclusively internally at levelling the field in Spain, which I don't particularly see a major problem with, but obviously Madrid and Barca won't want to fall that far behind the rest of Europe.
 
You're missing the point. I'm not talking about Real/Barca compared to Chelsea, or Granada compared to Leicester or QPR. I'm talking about the competition itself. If Madrid and Barca are scoring 5 or more in a quarter of all their games in a season, and winning the majority of all of their other games fairly comfortably too, then the competition structure needs to be reviewed at the very least. The gulf in class is just too much, fans will turn away.

It seems silly when the current champions are Atletico, and when Valencia in particular are having a bit of a renaissance, but the gap from top to bottom is huge in Spain, way bigger than any other major league, and is only widening. I fear that it's not sustainable.


But you did compare them...

Stat - this is the 15th game this season that either Madrid or Barca have scored 5 goals or more in a La Liga game. That's more than 25% of all games played by the two teams.
In over 300 games played in England this season involving 600 teams, only 7 teams have scored 5 or more in a game (City once, Arsenal once, Chelsea twice, Spurs once, Southampton once, Leicester once).
By no means is there a majority of games in Spain that are not competitive, but there are definitely far too many. It's tiresome from a neutral perspective - I suppose it's different if you're a Barca/Madrid fan.

And in my initial reply I also added that these teams routinely score the most goals of anyone (together with Bayern) in Europe as well. I'm not missing the point at all, you're just misrepresenting it by painting it as an exclusive La Liga problem instead of a modern football problem which is what it really is, just a "natural" evolution of the CL/PL and post-Bosman era. Spain's La Liga since around 2009 has become the favourite and oft-mentioned exponent of this development, but is by no means an exception.
 
:lol: the good old 'awful La Liga' thing comes up again. You'd think after Atletico won the league and all PL teams exited Europe before April it'd slow down a bit.
 
But you did compare them...



And in my initial reply I also added that these teams routinely score the most goals of anyone (together with Bayern) in Europe as well. I'm not missing the point at all, you're just misrepresenting it by painting it as an exclusive La Liga problem instead of a modern football problem which is what it really is, just a "natural" evolution of the CL/PL and post-Bosman era. Spain since around 2009 has become the favourite and oft-mentioned exponent of this development, but is by no means an exception.

What I'm comparing there is the level of competition - i.e. Real and Barca scoring 5 or more 15 times between them in less than 60 games is not good and shows a lack of competition in the league. By way of comparison, I mentioned the PL having just 7 teams hammering others in over 600 games, which shows greater competitiveness.

That's not comparing specific teams to others, and I'm not sure how you can infer it is. It doesn't mean that Granada are worse than Derby from years back, I'm not drawing those comparisons at all.

You've brought Bayern into it, and yes their domination of Germany doesn't look good for the German league, but on the other hand nobody would have predicted the collapse of Dortmund this year either. That kind of thing just couldn't happen to either Real or Barca in Spain, no chance.

Lack of competition may not concern you, but it is a worry. Some are arguing that the Championship is the most exciting league in Europe this year - excitement is important in football, even if sometimes it is at the expense of quality.
 
:lol: the good old 'awful La Liga' thing comes up again. You'd think after Atletico won the league and all PL teams exited Europe before April it'd slow down a bit.

Not the point anyone is making.
 
Because Madrid is not Getafe and Valencia is not Levante and Granada is not Sevilla.Madrid/Barcelona shouldn't get so much but I don't see fair that a team that is not attracting tv viewers is getting almost the same money than teams with history,fans and tradition.The teams would become franchises where the only important thing is a place among the 20 in la liga to get the money.Anyway something has to change since many teams are with huge debts but not so radically
 
Because Madrid is not Getafe and Valencia is not Levante and Granada is not Sevilla.Madrid/Barcelona shouldn't get so much but I don't see fair that a team that is not attracting tv viewers is getting almost the same money than teams with history,fans and tradition.The teams would become franchises where the only important thing is a place among the 20 in la liga to get the money.Anyway something has to change since many teams are with huge debts but not so radically

Your first post referred to "PL proportions". Do you think the above has happened in the PL? Are teams just franchises now?

Your argument that teams would only want to be in the top 20 to get money can easily be turned around to say that Barca and Real only want to preserve the status quo to get money. Not that I'm making that point, just that there's a different perspective to the one you're presenting.

Surely the fairest system is to divide the money out based on where a team finishes in the league, not just based on who they are?
 
Your first post referred to "PL proportions". Do you think the above has happened in the PL? Are teams just franchises now?

Your argument that teams would only want to be in the top 20 to get money can easily be turned around to say that Barca and Real only want to preserve the status quo to get money. Not that I'm making that point, just that there's a different perspective to the one you're presenting.

Surely the fairest system is to divide the money out based on where a team finishes in the league, not just based on who they are?
Of course they want to keep their status,but the fan base is not the same in Spain and England.I am writing with the phone and I can't check the info but how many million euros/pounds got United from tv deals? And QPR or Stoke?.who spent money in big signings?the guy from Shanghai that is watching premier league do it because of Di Maria,Mata,Rooney,Ozil,Hazard,etc or thanks to QPR,Sunderland,etc? in my opinion the big clubs are keeping the system using money related to marketing/advertisings ,based in history and tradition, paying hundreds in wages for top stars and therefore with huge debt.
 
Surely the fairest system is to divide the money out based on where a team finishes in the league, not just based on who they are?

They're moving to a version of that. The ratios aren't the same as the PL ones. Clubs consistently (a 5 year aggregate I think) in CL places will get the lion's share. Europa League clubs will do OK from it as well. Everyone except Athletic voted for the deal - basically because Athletic have the most to lose. The top two see their earnings go down, but not slashed. Clubs like Valencia/Atletico provided they don't slip down La Liga protect their revenue. Most other clubs will end up with more money than now.

The redistribution though is more about viability than competition. It'll help Liga clubs hang on to talent and it will help a lot of clubs avoid bankruptcy. The crunch is that it really is a much smaller pot of money than in England.

If the Spanish CL TV money was worth as much as the English version it wouldn't be quite so difficult a negotiation. As it is, they're very much aware that English clubs who make it through the group stage will probably earn at least as much as a Spanish club who win the Final - that's including Prize money.

Even with last year's deals, several clubs including United, Juve and PSG got more CL TV money than Madrid did, a gap that is expected to grow. But I doubt many PL clubs with CL aspirations will see that as unfair.
 
What I'm comparing there is the level of competition - i.e. Real and Barca scoring 5 or more 15 times between them in less than 60 games is not good and shows a lack of competition in the league. By way of comparison, I mentioned the PL having just 7 teams hammering others in over 600 games, which shows greater competitiveness.

That's not comparing specific teams to others, and I'm not sure how you can infer it is. It doesn't mean that Granada are worse than Derby from years back, I'm not drawing those comparisons at all.

Or maybe it shows that in La Liga goal difference doesn't matter so smaller teams don't just sit back and park the bus?
 
PL-centric fans are the biggest joke of all
 
Valencia stepping up the pressure on Villareal, who are sitting back. But it's still 0-0, about 10 minutes to play.
 
What I'm comparing there is the level of competition - i.e. Real and Barca scoring 5 or more 15 times between them in less than 60 games is not good and shows a lack of competition in the league. By way of comparison, I mentioned the PL having just 7 teams hammering others in over 600 games, which shows greater competitiveness.

That's not comparing specific teams to others, and I'm not sure how you can infer it is. It doesn't mean that Granada are worse than Derby from years back, I'm not drawing those comparisons at all.

You've brought Bayern into it, and yes their domination of Germany doesn't look good for the German league, but on the other hand nobody would have predicted the collapse of Dortmund this year either. That kind of thing just couldn't happen to either Real or Barca in Spain, no chance.

Lack of competition may not concern you, but it is a worry. Some are arguing that the Championship is the most exciting league in Europe this year - excitement is important in football, even if sometimes it is at the expense of quality.


You misunderstand, it's not a concern insofar as it's simply the (unfortunate) reality of the current era (which was initiated with the inception of CL, PL and growing globalization of the game in the 90s and the influential Bosman ruling). Compared to pre-CL/PL/Bosman era football is incredibly more uneven now (that said, financial "inequality" has historically always played a major part in deciding titles etc.). La Liga is only marginally worse, if at all, than the PL and Bundesliga in that respect...
 
Anyway, back to business. That haul brought Cristiano to 299 goals* for Real Madrid in all competitions, in a mere 5-and-a-half seasons. Astounding!

*and not 300 like Marca are still embarrassingly claiming.


As for this season, that's him on 36 league goals (four ahead of Messi); he's looking good for the Pichichi, also considering RM and Barça's schedules. Tonight, a tough away for the blaugrana at Balaídos. Messi apparently been struggling with a swollen ankle/foot since the 2nd City game.