The relative strength of the Premier League

Iker Quesadillas said:
This sounds superficially nice, except



Half of these appearances in finals come from a single club: Liverpool. They also happen to be the most successful English club in European competition, historically. So the dynamic is actually pretty similar to La Liga. You can make the same statement, really, PL had 2 "super teams" but "it was an aberration", and so forth.
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But the two la liga appearances over the last 5 years have both come from real Madrid. Not half the appearances.

That wasn't my point though, it's that real and Barca had teams over the last ten years that no amount of premier league money was going to overcome, but the Ronaldo and Messi superteams are gone and now the financial strength of the premier league carries more weight
 
telstar96 said:
Well it's probably the biggest indicator, especially over a number of years, how strong a particular league is when competing against the best teams from the other major European leagues.

UCL wins doesn't necessarily translate to having the best league. Serie A in the 90's is testament to this. Italy had 3 winners in the decade, which is equal to the number of winners Spain had. However, Italian clubs as a whole were more competitive in European competitions, for a myriad of reasons, hence why the league was considered the best in the world at the time. So even if the premier league isn't producing winners every season, English teams are consistently going deep in the Champions League, Europa League and Conference League.


Also you make reference to this period but at the time the Bundesliga was considered to be the strongest league in Europe. They consistently had teams going deep in all the 3 major Uefa competitions. In fact the 1980 Uefa Cup semi final featured 4 German teams, the only time a semi final has featured teams from one nation in any Uefa competition. If you include the quarter finals, then there were 5 German sides. That's pretty substantial. So to disregard teams that play in the quarters and semi's, is to disregard the argument of strongest league in Europe.
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A) wrong. Serie A was generally considered to be the strongest league in Europe from the mid 80s to the mid 90s. By the time you get to the late 90s and the early 2000s, the hierarchy was much muddier. It was considered to be the best league for 2 reasons: 1) All the best players from around the world played there (Maradona, Van Basten, Platini, Gullit, Laudrup, Zico for a bit, etc)
2) They WERE dominant in terms of WINNING European competitions. During that period, Italian teams won the most European Cups (with a back to back win included), UEFA Cups (with a 3 in a row slot included) and Cup Winners Cups (along with Spain and England). So the dominance was reflected in terms of money, winning and top players wanting to play there. When was the last time PL teams won 2 CLs in a row? Or two UEFA Cups in a row?

B) I don't think it was the case that the German league was considered to he definitely the strongest league at that time. Who considered it to be that? It's a given that this was thought about 80s/90s Serie A but one of the key reasons that Serie A had that status is not applicable: a large number of the best players from around the world playing there. Not saying that it wasn't a very strong league but it definitely wasn't a situation like Italy, where that league was clearly on top above all others.
 
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jm99 said:
That wasn't my point though, it's that real and Barca had teams over the last ten years that no amount of premier league money was going to overcome, but the Ronaldo and Messi superteams are gone and now the financial strength of the premier league carries more weight
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Over the last 10 years, Atletico Madrid have more final appearances than Barcelona, and a similar number of semifinals. In fact, Atletico had more finals than City, United, or Spurs. So it is not true that it was Real Madrid and Barcelona being too good.
 
Iker Quesadillas said:
Over the last 10 years, Atletico Madrid have more final appearances than Barcelona, and a similar number of semifinals. In fact, Atletico had more finals than City, United, or Spurs. So it is not true that it was Real Madrid and Barcelona being too good.
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During the period of 08/09-17/18 Barca won 3 champions leagues and real 4 out of 10. These teams were largely pretty dominant for that decade. Since then we've had 2 all English finals and we're a heartbeat away from a 3rd.
 
Andrade said:
A) wrong. Serie A was generally considered to be the strongest league in Europe from the mid 80s to the mid 90s. By the time you get to the late 90s and the early 2000s, the hierarchy was much muddier. It was considered to be the best league for 2 reasons: 1) All the best players from around the world played there (Maradona, Van Basten, Platini, Gullit, Laudrup, Zico for a bit, etc)
2) They WERE dominant in terms of WINNING European competitions. During that period, Italian teams won the most European Cups (with a back to back win included), UEFA Cups (with a 3 in a row slot included) and Cup Winners Cups (along with Spain and England). So the dominance was reflected in terms of money, winning and top players wanting to play there. When was the last time PL teams won 2 CLs in a row? Or two UEFA Cups in a row?

B) I don't think it was the case that the German league was considered to he definitely the strongest league at that time. Who considered it to be that? It's a given that this was thought about 80s/90s Serie A but one of the key reasons that Serie A had that status is not applicable: a large number of the best players from around the world playing there. Not saying that it wasn't a very strong league but it definitely wasn't a situation like Italy, where that league was clearly on top above all others.
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Bundesliga had the highest UEFA coefficient in the 80s, most of their teams were doing great in Europe.

Serie A might have been considered a bit better just for having Maradona,Platini, and Zico, but in terms of european performances it was pretty even with Bundesliga.
 
FrankFoot said:
Bundesliga had the highest UEFA coefficient in the 80s, most of their teams were doing great in Europe.

Serie A might have been considered a bit better just for having Maradona,Platini, and Zico, but in terms of european performances it was pretty even with Bundesliga.
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Which years in the 80s? I was talking about the mid 70s until mid 80s. Obviously, after the mid 80s, English clubs were banned.
 
Long Time Red said:
The difference is that the bottom half of the Premier League would absolutely batter the bottom half teams in La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga and Ligue 1.
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We dont have a european tournament for bottom half teams (yet?), so how are we supposed to measure this? La Liga is the best league in EL, but that is often brushed aside by PL fans who say their teams don't care about it.
Finalists in EL since 97-98 (when they changed to one game in the final)
La Liga 12-2 (1 final was all-Spanish)
PL 4-6 (1 final was all-English)
 
Korwas said:
We dont have a european tournament for bottom half teams (yet?), so how are we supposed to measure this? La Liga is the best league in EL, but that is often brushed aside by PL fans who say their teams don't care about it.
Finalists in EL since 97-98 (when they changed to one game in the final)
La Liga 12-2 (1 final was all-Spanish)
PL 4-6 (1 final was all-English)
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Honestly I’m not sure the person you quoted is correct anyway. Being competitive in a domestic league is one thing but certainly from a lower level European perspective English clubs haven’t really done so well. As your statistics prove. Beyond Middlesbrough in 2006 who were soundly beaten in the final by UEFA cup masters Sevilla and Fulham in 2010 who lost to Atletico England has not done well at that level.

Tottenham trash performances, Liverpool winners in 2001 and runner up in 2016, Arsenal runner up 2000 and 2019, United Winners in 2017 and runner up in 2021 and Chelsea winners in 2013 and 2019.

Even for our best teams that’s fecking poor really. Tottenham with the most disgraceful representation out of the big clubs even in the conference league. If our best clubs don’t do it regularly I highly doubt Bournemouth or Wolves will be smashing the lesser European teams.
 
Andrade said:
A) wrong. Serie A was generally considered to be the strongest league in Europe from the mid 80s to the mid 90s. By the time you get to the late 90s and the early 2000s, the hierarchy was much muddier. It was considered to be the best league for 2 reasons: 1) All the best players from around the world played there (Maradona, Van Basten, Platini, Gullit, Laudrup, Zico for a bit, etc)
2) They WERE dominant in terms of WINNING European competitions. During that period, Italian teams won the most European Cups (with a back to back win included), UEFA Cups (with a 3 in a row slot included) and Cup Winners Cups (along with Spain and England). So the dominance was reflected in terms of money, winning and top players wanting to play there. When was the last time PL teams won 2 CLs in a row? Or two UEFA Cups in a row?
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How was I wrong in stating Serie A was considered the best league in the 90's? All you've done is chosen a different time period to prove a point that UCL wins matter. I only picked the 1990s as that was the most consecutive years Serie A was ranked 1st in the UEFA country coefficient. The best players in the world played in Serie A throughout the 1990s (R9, Maldini, Baresi, Batigol, Baggio, Zidane etc) and they were still very competitive in Europe. Juve reached 3 UCL finals in a row.

Andrade said:
B) I don't think it was the case that the German league was considered to he definitely the strongest league at that time. Who considered it to be that? It's a given that this was thought about 80s/90s Serie A but one of the key reasons that Serie A had that status is not applicable: a large number of the best players from around the world playing there. Not saying that it wasn't a very strong league but it definitely wasn't a situation like Italy, where that league was clearly on top above all others.
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Well Uefa Coefficient had it ranked the best league in Europe for 8 consecutive years, due to the fact they were super competitive in all the major European Competitions despite not winning the UCL consistently. Between 1976-1981 the winner of the Ballon D'or was from a German club. They had the best players in the world playing in the league at the time. Keegan left Liverpool who had just won the EC, to play for a team that had barely won anything in Germany for decades. Yes it may not have hit the same level of stardom Serie A did but it was still a very strong league and best in Europe at the time.

My point is that winning isn't as important as you're making it out to be. Serie A in the period you described was a incredibly strong league, especially with the quality of players it had, which hasn't been rivalled since. Yet going off wins and the criteria you've used to assess league strength, they'd pale in comparison to La Liga of the 2010's. Does that mean Serie A in the mid 80s to 90s is inferior to La Liga of the 2010s? I don't think so unless you believe that wins are the be all and end all and as you said, who cares about quarter finals and semis? Or even number of runners up? Don't you think that's a bit dismissive? Only a sith deals in absolutes
 
telstar96 said:
How was I wrong in stating Serie A was considered the best league in the 90's? All you've done is chosen a different time period to prove a point that UCL wins matter. I only picked the 1990s as that was the most consecutive years Serie A was ranked 1st in the UEFA country coefficient. The best players in the world played in Serie A throughout the 1990s (R9, Maldini, Baresi, Batigol, Baggio, Zidane etc) and they were still very competitive in Europe. Juve reached 3 UCL finals in a row.


Well Uefa Coefficient had it ranked the best league in Europe for 8 consecutive years, due to the fact they were super competitive in all the major European Competitions despite not winning the UCL consistently. Between 1976-1981 the winner of the Ballon D'or was from a German club. They had the best players in the world playing in the league at the time. Keegan left Liverpool who had just won the EC, to play for a team that had barely won anything in Germany for decades. Yes it may not have hit the same level of stardom Serie A did but it was still a very strong league and best in Europe at the time.

My point is that winning isn't as important as you're making it out to be. Serie A in the period you described was a incredibly strong league, especially with the quality of players it had, which hasn't been rivalled since. Yet going off wins and the criteria you've used to assess league strength, they'd pale in comparison to La Liga of the 2010's. Does that mean Serie A in the mid 80s to 90s is inferior to La Liga of the 2010s? I don't think so unless you believe that wins are the be all and end all and as you said, who cares about quarter finals and semis? Or even number of runners up? Don't you think that's a bit dismissive? Only a sith deals in absolutes
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But aren't we all accepting Serie A being the best league ever at some point in the 90 because of AC Milan winning and competing in the Champions League so well?

Specifically between 1988 and 1995, 3 titles, 5 finals, 1 QF over 7 years.
And between 2002 and 2007, 2 titles, 3 finals, 1 SF, 1 QF over 5 years.

I think this is pretty impressive

1988-1989 Win vs Steaua Bucarest
1989-1990 Win vs Benfica
1990-1991 QF

1992-1993 Final lost vs Marseille
1993-1994 Win vs Barcelona
1994-1995 Final lost vs Ajax

1996-1997 Group stage

1999-2000 Group stage
2000-2001 Group stage

2002-2003 Win vs Juventus
2003-2004 QF
2004-2005 Final lost vs Liverpool
2005-2006 SF
2006-2007 Win vs Liverpool
 
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jm99 said:
During the period of 08/09-17/18 Barca won 3 champions leagues and real 4 out of 10. These teams were largely pretty dominant for that decade. Since then we've had 2 all English finals and we're a heartbeat away from a 3rd.
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We were closer to 3 separate Spanish champions (Ramos drew the final against Atletico in minute 92:48) than to 3 all-English finals (Rodrygo drew the semifinal against City in minute 90:50).

Listen, nobody here is actually saying the PL isn't better right now. Certainly not me. But ask yourself why all this "ifs" and "buts" apply to every league other than the PL. Why is any appearance of a PL team in a CL final the direct result of the inherent superiority of the league, and any appearance of a team from another league simply that specific team being good?
 
Well we just outplayed and knocked out a team that is bound to win the Primera and they did throw the kitchen sink at us.
 
norm87cro said:
Well we just outplayed and knocked out a team that is bound to win the Primera and they did throw the kitchen sink at us.
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Yeah but it's Barcelona, what they do in Europe isn't indicative of anything, they've been a laughing stock for years
 
Gasolin said:
But aren't we all accepting Serie A being the best league ever at some point in the 90 because of AC Milan winning and competing in the Champions League so well?

Specifically between 1988 and 1995, 3 titles, 5 finals, 1 QF over 7 years.
And between 2002 and 2007, 2 titles, 3 finals, 1 SF, 1 QF over 5 years.

I think this is pretty impressive

1988-1989 Win vs Steaua Bucarest
1989-1990 Win vs Benfica
1990-1991 QF

1992-1993 Final lost vs Marseille
1993-1994 Win vs Barcelona
1994-1995 Final lost vs Ajax

1996-1997 Group stage

1999-2000 Group stage
2000-2001 Group stage

2002-2003 Win vs Juventus
2003-2004 QF
2004-2005 Final lost vs Liverpool
2005-2006 SF
2006-2007 Win vs Liverpool
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Yh the fact AC Milan were able to go on that run is what makes them a special club. My original point is that quarters, semis and runners up are relevant to assessing league strength.

So while Milan were either doing well or not doing so well, other Italian teams were reaching the latter stages of the UCL, Uefa cup and cup winners cup, which definitely contributed to the status of serie a being the best league at that time.
 
Iker Quesadillas said:
We were closer to 3 separate Spanish champions (Ramos drew the final against Atletico in minute 92:48) than to 3 all-English finals (Rodrygo drew the semifinal against City in minute 90:50).

Listen, nobody here is actually saying the PL isn't better right now. Certainly not me. But ask yourself why all this "ifs" and "buts" apply to every league other than the PL. Why is any appearance of a PL team in a CL final the direct result of the inherent superiority of the league, and any appearance of a team from another league simply that specific team being good?
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Because we're talking about right now and the effect that massive TV deals and multiple sugar daddy owners are going to have going forward. No one can deny during the last decade la liga was the strongest league, but since Ronaldo and Messi have left and atletico have fallen a fair bit the Premier league is the strongest league.

Now normally these things are cyclical, but with Newcastle, City and maybe us joining them soon having essentially unlimited budgets, not to mention tv deals multiple times more than any other league, its hard to see how it'll cycle away from the Premier league any time soon. Of course real, Barca and bayern will always be strong teams, but the financial strength of the Premier league, the fact clubs can be bought by sugar daddy owners means barring a minor miracle, it will stay as the strongest league for the foreseeable future
 
telstar96 said:
How was I wrong in stating Serie A was considered the best league in the 90's? All you've done is chosen a different time period to prove a point that UCL wins matter. I only picked the 1990s as that was the most consecutive years Serie A was ranked 1st in the UEFA country coefficient. The best players in the world played in Serie A throughout the 1990s (R9, Maldini, Baresi, Batigol, Baggio, Zidane etc) and they were still very competitive in Europe. Juve reached 3 UCL finals in a row.


Well Uefa Coefficient had it ranked the best league in Europe for 8 consecutive years, due to the fact they were super competitive in all the major European Competitions despite not winning the UCL consistently. Between 1976-1981 the winner of the Ballon D'or was from a German club. They had the best players in the world playing in the league at the time. Keegan left Liverpool who had just won the EC, to play for a team that had barely won anything in Germany for decades. Yes it may not have hit the same level of stardom Serie A did but it was still a very strong league and best in Europe at the time.

My point is that winning isn't as important as you're making it out to be. Serie A in the period you described was a incredibly strong league, especially with the quality of players it had, which hasn't been rivalled since. Yet going off wins and the criteria you've used to assess league strength, they'd pale in comparison to La Liga of the 2010's. Does that mean Serie A in the mid 80s to 90s is inferior to La Liga of the 2010s? I don't think so unless you believe that wins are the be all and end all and as you said, who cares about quarter finals and semis? Or even number of runners up? Don't you think that's a bit dismissive? Only a sith deals in absolutes
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A) Please show your source for the co-efficient, then we can better discuss. What I can see (on wiki) shows a swapping of England and Germany at the top in the 70s and 80s, with England being at the top when English clubs were banned. It also appears that Spain took over from Italy at the top of the rankings in the mid to late 90s. BTW, if you're going to list the great players in Italy to show the worldwide pull of the league in the late 90s, it doesn't really work if half your list is Italians; obviously they are likely to be playing in Italy. Homegrown great players is not the point. Not to mention that some of the guys you named were at their best in the earlier period that I referenced.

B) I actually think that La Liga in the 2010s was comparable to Seria A in the 80s. Not only did they have the best players (which you've referenced as being important), they also had by far the most wins in the CL and the EL, they were top of the coefficient (which you've referenced as being important) and they had the most Ballon D'Or wins (which you've referenced as being important). The best players from England also went there (which you've referenced as being important re Keegan). The only reason IMO it's not viewed like peak Serie A is the insistence by PL fans that despite all the above evidence, the PL was a better and more competitive league during that time. Hmmm. Sounds familiar.....

I think the PL has taken over at the top now but only in the last few years and I still maintain that supposed dominance must translate to wins. You'll get no argument from me that the German league in the 70s and 80s was strong but was it dominant over England? I don't think so.

C) There is no such thing as a Sith. Please stop giving George Lucas and Disney money. They have more than enough :lol:
 
giorno said:
Missing the point. Every transfer has the potential to fail. But a 20 year old who fails can still be resold relatively easily. A 30 year old, not so much
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We just had to give away Luka Jovic for literally zero euros.
 
jm99 said:
Now normally these things are cyclical, but with Newcastle, City and maybe us joining them soon having essentially unlimited budgets, not to mention tv deals multiple times more than any other league, its hard to see how it'll cycle away from the Premier league any time soon.
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It's not that hard for me to see: if the PL keeps squandering its financial advantages on players that aren't top-top-top level and if it keeps accepting lower standards then it is always at risk of having down periods.
 
Iker Quesadillas said:
It's not that hard for me to see: if the PL keeps squandering its financial advantages on players that aren't top-top-top level and if it keeps accepting lower standards then it is always at risk of having down periods.
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I don't see why this is so difficult for you. Yes, maybe the Premier league won't make use of its financial advantage, but largely financial strength and success have a lot of correlation. When Serie A was splashing the cash, they were the strongest league, bayern's financial advantage over the rest of the league means they're always favourites. In la liga real and Barca have huge financial advantages, yes they're big historically but it's the money that really matters.

Maybe the Premier league's financial strength won't keep it as the strongest league but it seems more likely that it will
 
jm99 said:
During the period of 08/09-17/18 Barca won 3 champions leagues and real 4 out of 10. These teams were largely pretty dominant for that decade. Since then we've had 2 all English finals and we're a heartbeat away from a 3rd.
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I don't know if that's going to be the case this year. There isn't an English side ahead in their ties. Liverpool are out, Chelsea are in woeful form, spurs are behind, I could see city being the only ones to progress to the QF.
 
jm99 said:
I don't see why this is so difficult for you. Yes, maybe the Premier league won't make use of its financial advantage, but largely financial strength and success have a lot of correlation. When Serie A was splashing the cash, they were the strongest league, bayern's financial advantage over the rest of the league means they're always favourites. In la liga real and Barca have huge financial advantages, yes they're big historically but it's the money that really matters.

Maybe the Premier league's financial strength won't keep it as the strongest league but it seems more likely that it will
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The annoying thing for me is rather the ignorance that's connected to this. I don't bother if somebody thinks the EPL is the strongest league in the world because it has 6 top teams with huge spending power.

But it doesn't stop there. People claim it is 'miles ahead' and while money is probably the modt important success factor as you describe it, the price tags of footballers grow exponentially and clubs ask for higher fees when they know the buyer sits on huge amounts of cash. Which means there's only so much surplus in quality money can buy you and it is a lot less than people seem to think.

Another example: The bottom half clubs in the EPL would wipe the floor with the bottom half of other leagues. There's not even indication of this, no point of reference, nothing. Just a statement out of the blue, delivered with absolute convincement that probably stems from decades of ESPN advertisement brainwashing (that by far predates the current dominant phase of the EPL by the way).
 
jm99 said:
Because we're talking about right now and the effect that massive TV deals and multiple sugar daddy owners are going to have going forward. No one can deny during the last decade la liga was the strongest league, but since Ronaldo and Messi have left and atletico have fallen a fair bit the Premier league is the strongest league.

Now normally these things are cyclical, but with Newcastle, City and maybe us joining them soon having essentially unlimited budgets, not to mention tv deals multiple times more than any other league, its hard to see how it'll cycle away from the Premier league any time soon. Of course real, Barca and bayern will always be strong teams, but the financial strength of the Premier league, the fact clubs can be bought by sugar daddy owners means barring a minor miracle, it will stay as the strongest league for the foreseeable future
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I seem to recall plenty of people denying this.
 
Zehner said:
The annoying thing for me is rather the ignorance that's connected to this. I don't bother if somebody thinks the EPL is the strongest league in the world because it has 6 top teams with huge spending power.

But it doesn't stop there. People claim it is 'miles ahead' and while money is probably the modt important success factor as you describe it, the price tags of footballers grow exponentially and clubs ask for higher fees when they know the buyer sits on huge amounts of cash. Which means there's only so much surplus in quality money can buy you and it is a lot less than people seem to think.

Another example: The bottom half clubs in the EPL would wipe the floor with the bottom half of other leagues. There's not even indication of this, no point of reference, nothing. Just a statement out of the blue, delivered with absolute convincement that probably stems from decades of ESPN advertisement brainwashing (that by far predates the current dominant phase of the EPL by the way).
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I think the bottom half statement is looking at things like forest coming up and being able to spend over 150m.

Yes there's a PL tax and clubs pay more, but it doesn't completely negate that financial advantage.
 
Andrade said:
I seem to recall plenty of people denying this.
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Well I mean it wasn't as competitive, the hugely unbalanced TV deals saw to that (I think they've changed it now), and England usually would have 4 Champions Legaue level clubs that you would back to make thr last 16 in most seasons, but clearly the strength of those real and Barca teams obviously meant it was a stronger league in terms of having favourites to win the champions league
 
jm99 said:
Well I mean it wasn't as competitive, the hugely unbalanced TV deals saw to that (I think they've changed it now), and England usually would have 4 Champions Legaue level clubs that you would back to make thr last 16 in most seasons, but clearly the strength of those real and Barca teams obviously meant it was a stronger league in terms of having favourites to win the champions league
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Nope, Spanish teams dominated the Europa League as well.
 
jm99 said:
I don't see why this is so difficult for you. Yes, maybe the Premier league won't make use of its financial advantage, but largely financial strength and success have a lot of correlation.
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There's also pretty good correlation between success and "having Pep Guardiola as manager" which is what happened when Barcelona were dominating and when City are dominating. But presumably he's closer to the end than to the beginning of his stint there. So what's the plan, use the PL's financial might to clone him?
 
Andrade said:
Nope, Spanish teams dominated the Europa League as well.
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How often did English teams take europa seriously though?

Over the last decade there's basically been a minimum of 3 English teams make it out the group stage of the champions league, over the last 5 years its been normally all 4 and on one occasion 5 teams in the last 16 of the champions league, that's far more reflective than going far in the europa league, to qualify for the europa league, it's by being not good enough for the last 16 of the champions league. You'll get exceptions sure, but that's generally the case
 
Iker Quesadillas said:
There's also pretty good correlation between success and "having Pep Guardiola as manager" which is what happened when Barcelona were dominating and when City are dominating. But presumably he's closer to the end than to the beginning of his stint there. So what's the plan, use the PL's financial might to clone him?
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City have had one CL final in 7 years under him, Bayern went from treble winners to no champions league finals in 3 years, a lot of things you can say about pep, but brilliant in the champions league isn't one of them.

The Premier league has about 6 teams that if they qualify for the champions league you'd back to make at least the quarter finals, la liga has 2, 3 at push.
 
jm99 said:
How often did English teams take europa seriously though?

Over the last decade there's basically been a minimum of 3 English teams make it out the group stage of the champions league, over the last 5 years its been normally all 4 and on one occasion 5 teams in the last 16 of the champions league, that's far more reflective than going far in the europa league, to qualify for the europa league, it's by being not good enough for the last 16 of the champions league. You'll get exceptions sure, but that's generally the case
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I mean if the excuse now is that English teams don't take European competitions seriously then I don't really know where to go from there, bud.
 
Andrade said:
I mean if the excuse now is that English teams don't take European competitions seriously then I don't really know where to go from there, bud.
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The excuse is that you can qualify for the knockout stages of the europa league by getting dumped out of the group stages of the champions league, qualifying for the last 16 of the champions league is better than any europa league achievement as a result. You're basically saying because English teams consistently qualified from their groups that's worse than getting knocked out then going on to win a much easier competition
 
Cup competitions are not the best way to determine the strength of a league. You only need to look at countries individually to see that it is very rare for the best side to win every cup in their country, however the league tends to be won by the actual best team. Leagues have always been the best way to determine the strongest, so you will never actually know the answer to this until a super league is actually created.

Real Madrid won the Champions League 3 times in a row, but they only managed to win La Liga once in that same period. Who is actually the best in two of these three years then? Is it Real Madrid or Barcelona, who beat Real Madrid to La Liga twice?

In 17/18, they only managed to get 76 points and finished 3rd, so were they actually the best team in Europe that season? It seems to indicate more that they had a knack of beating big sides, but seemed to slip up against lower teams. The Champions League doesn't consider the latter to the same extent as a league, even though it is a massive part of football.

You can't really even determine who is the actual best in La Liga in this period, so doing it across leagues is not possible. They also don't play each other enough to get an accurate view.
 
jm99 said:
The excuse is that you can qualify for the knockout stages of the europa league by getting dumped out of the group stages of the champions league, qualifying for the last 16 of the champions league is better than any europa league achievement as a result. You're basically saying because English teams consistently qualified from their groups that's worse than getting knocked out then going on to win a much easier competition
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No I'm not saying that. I'm saying that Spanish teams won both competitions much more than English teams and you're somehow trying to spin it to indicate that English teams were still in fact better.
 
Andrade said:
No I'm not saying that. I'm saying that Spanish teams won both competitions much more than English teams and you're somehow trying to spin it to indicate that English teams were still in fact better.
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Well yes, consistently reaching the last 16 by qualifying from your group is much better than finishing 3rd in your group then going on to win the weaker competition
 
ErikElevenHag said:
I don't know if that's going to be the case this year. There isn't an English side ahead in their ties. Liverpool are out, Chelsea are in woeful form, spurs are behind, I could see city being the only ones to progress to the QF.
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I meant were it autocorrected to we're, I was meaning last year where we were a couple of minutes away from 3 all English finals in 4 years
 
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