The relative strength of the Premier League
- Thread starter Wumminator
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I don't think it is that bullshit when the team like Spurs isn't that great beyond their first 11. What last night showed was that if they're missing a number of their key players they aren't as good as the league suggests, so to have those key players rested and available for each league game is crucial if they want to win the title.
No, we can field them because we have a coach who knows how to rotate and enough quality in the squad to support it.
We fielded an A team despite having played with nearly the exact same one a highly intese match vs. Bayern last Saturday.
We are playing the tactically extremely well set up 5th placed Mainz (which managed to beat Bayern two weeks ago btw) this weekend, while Spurs play Aston fecking Villa. Are you suggesting that your fixture is harder than ours? Because the EPL is that much stronger that a nearly guarantueed relegated team poses a bigger threat than a German club with a shot at a CL place? This was the situation the respective coaches were faced with before yesterdays game so where is the excuse for Pochettino?
Hell, lets for arguments sake say that the EPL is more competive than the Bundesliga (I actually think it is, but the difference is way smaller than you suggest). How does
make Dortmund´s job easier compared to Spurs to compete for the title? Take a look at the tables. Your table leader by 5 points has 60 points in total, we have 58. Difference being that we played four games less so our point average is way higher. Even with so much success on the pitch, we are trailing by five points. Why? Because we compete against an European elite team which is head and shoulders above anything in the EPL. This means we have to win pretty much every game to just stay in reach and keeep the small chance alive. There is basically no margin for error. One bad day, one slip up and the title race is over. If you think we can just take it easy in the league and keep up this extremely good point average, you simply don´t watch the league. It is that simple. German teams would have to do a lot worse than they do to build this argument.
I agree that Spurs aren't that good. I don't agree that the league is as amazing as Glastonater says though.
Neither do I. I'd argue it's the most exciting league but not the best, but i also think that sometimes fans of opposition leagues too easily take the bait or retort far too defensively against a tiny 'joke league' comment, which makes it hard to discuss properly. Balu is one of the few that can debate without getting arrogant or overly defensive about it in my opinion.
We fielded 3 players from our best XI. Which teams would be "that great" if they did the same away against Dortmund?
So because Dortmund wins virtually every game to keep up with another club that virtually wins every game means its a competitive league?
That makes no sense to me
It's not just about the next league match, it's also about the game after that and the game after that one. And as I've said, realistically Dortmund have little chance of over-taking BM whether you rest players or not.
But Spurs have a significantly bigger league-title chance than do Dortmund, whilst at the same time being not yet certain of a CL spot by virtue of league-placing (again unlike Dortmund) On those grounds alone Pochettino's decision can be justified.
If Spurs do make it into the CL next season, then I hope we get to play Dortmund again ... in which case Pochettino will field his best available team and you won't find it so easy.
You are deluded if you think Spurs would have a chance against Dortmund. So really something I'd expect from you
I'll give you the Lloris one, as for the rest I'm not all that convinced. The prems standards are at an all time low, being the best in this league isn't much to write home about anymore. I mean, Kante and Drinkwater have probably been the best midfield combo this season so that should tell you where the league is at. Lets put like this, we're at the lowest point we've been in a very long time but you wont hear to many United fans salivating at the idea of signing any of those players. Its not really a fluke, its taking advantage of a dire state of affairs.
You're not wrong, but at the same time i've been fighting your corner quite heavily! They wouldn't be, but i think that it's further emphasizing the need for you to have your key players in the league as i don't believe that a fair amount of your back-up XI is good enough. If you win or come 2nd in the league though that will change quite easily.
I think we will have to wait until next season's CL to see how good this Spurs side really are and if they can handle playing first team in both CL and league. Btw it got me thinking, is this Spurs team better than the one they had 6 years ago with the likes of Bale, Modric, Palyuchenko, Gallas, Van Der Vaart, Cudicini etc? I think that Spurs team had the better players but as a team i'm not sure as i'm not a Spurs fan. That was a really good team though.
There is a difference between 'the best' and 'the most competitive'. I believe it's the latter Glaston was arguing, no?
Nearly no team would, which is why pretty much no one attempts that.
This is actually what annoys me about this match. People can talk about Pochettino giving the league a higher priority to be better prepared all they want, but yesterday´s line up was not so much about resting players, it was a capitulation on your side before the whistle was even blown. The fact you decided to leave Dier at home and then not even start Dembele left me completely dumbfounded. How did you expect to have any impact on the midfield with basically your whole spine missing? We utterly dominated it and did not even have the two players (Gündogan and Sahin) on the pitch who would capitalize on it the most. We did not even had to fight for it. It did not even matter that Lamela and Kane were not there as your whole attack was completely cut off from the rest(main reason why Eriksen was invisible nearly the whole match).
The aftermath of that match felt like advancing in an early German cup tie against a lower league team. Happy to have won and have seen some nice football, but not excited like it should be in an European night. I don´t just want my team to play internationally to win there, I want them to compete against good teams and produce great matches, not just walk over a team which did not even put up a real fight, which is something I´m not used to see at the Westfalenstadium. I feel sorry for my two friends, whom I gave my tickets and talked into it going there because I was unable to go myself. I feel even more sorry for your away support.
Dunno. I probably made the mistake to get my hopes up about this tie. We never met on the Interntaional stage before and you guys play a great season. Did not expect them to travel to Germany while already waving the white flag.
Look guys, at the end of the day Poch thinks his chance of beating Villa is higher by resting key players against Dortmund. The PL has a significantly higher priority than the EL. Unfortunately football clubs really do not give a shit about 'aspiring to beat top clubs' as much as us fans do. Qualifying for the CL means more money and exposure. And yes, when they'll actually play CL, they might not field their best XI in those matches because again, the PL has a higher priority. Qualifying for the CL is more important than the CL itself, sort of.
Indeed it is. However, even saying that EPL is the most competitive league is too much. In respect to what league? Certainly, it is not competitive with respect to Nigeria's league. Or Poland's league. Or could I say, Bundesliga? After all, in the last 10 years there have been more teams who won Bundesliga that have won EPL. There have been more teams that qualified in UCL from Bundesliga than from EPL.
Even if we do a comparison with the two horse league, La Liga, is there any difference bar in the narrative. Just look in the last 3, 5, or 10 years and you will see that the number of teams who won the league is the same in both countries, while the number of teams who qualified for UCL (and Europa/UEFA) is higher in La Liga than in EPL.
So, how exactly is EPL more competitive than Bundesliga and La Liga?
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And that is not going into the nonsense that it has the most quality teams despite that the top that England can offer are third tier teams in Europe.
'Significantly weaker' was the term Glaston used. The whole 'more competitive' thing means feck all when you want to judge the quality of the smaller teams in different leagues (and that's exactly what he's doing), because it doesn't take into account how good the teams at the top actually are. It's just the new narrative after the Premier League has moved on from being the least competitive league with the biggest gap between the top and the bottom teams during the last decade to what we have now. It's such a lazy way to dismiss the quality of the top teams in other leagues by just saying 'they have it easier than we do', even though there isn't anything other than lazy cliches to back it up.
Well the idea to back it up is what this thread was here for. It got derailed into a summer project but as I've tried to provide evidence numerous times.
Some of the evidence we've looked at so far (this is mostly Bundesliga v prem at this point)
A) the vast financial advantage of the prem
B) the players who have been in both lesgue and the varying degrees of success (I seemed to show that most attackers score more in the Bundesliga despite less games IMO)
C) impartial evidence based on awards and experts (the premier league having most of the best young players in the world based on the world's journalists)
D) we started to look at some side by side analysis of teams in similar positions (this will be expanded on in the summer)
What i would like to happen at some point is that we identify some of the Bundesliga's top talent as of now and over the years we can see where they end up.
Some of the evidence we've looked at so far (this is mostly Bundesliga v prem at this point)
A) the vast financial advantage of the prem
B) the players who have been in both lesgue and the varying degrees of success (I seemed to show that most attackers score more in the Bundesliga despite less games IMO)
C) impartial evidence based on awards and experts (the premier league having most of the best young players in the world based on the world's journalists)
D) we started to look at some side by side analysis of teams in similar positions (this will be expanded on in the summer)
What i would like to happen at some point is that we identify some of the Bundesliga's top talent as of now and over the years we can see where they end up.
I think saying that it's the most competitive just means the level between all the teams is closer than in other leagues, and therefore most encounters (except against Villa 
) are difficult. If you don't believe it's the case, fair enough, but I'd say it's fairly accepted that it's a very competitive league. Not really talking about the Nigerian and Polish league, just the major ones. But I think you know that. The fact more different teams have won it doesn't contradict this for me, saying it's the most competitive is more addressing the fact that the teams between the 5th and 15th position are strong and are very difficult to beat, not that they're actually in with a shot to win it. Typically, this year in the PL, Arsenal could well win it and the historic status quo wouldn't be exchanged (they've won it in the last 15 years after all), but that wouldn't mean this season hasn't been highly competitive with teams losing points against everyone.
) are difficult. If you don't believe it's the case, fair enough, but I'd say it's fairly accepted that it's a very competitive league. Not really talking about the Nigerian and Polish league, just the major ones. But I think you know that. The fact more different teams have won it doesn't contradict this for me, saying it's the most competitive is more addressing the fact that the teams between the 5th and 15th position are strong and are very difficult to beat, not that they're actually in with a shot to win it. Typically, this year in the PL, Arsenal could well win it and the historic status quo wouldn't be exchanged (they've won it in the last 15 years after all), but that wouldn't mean this season hasn't been highly competitive with teams losing points against everyone.
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I can not keep repeating myself enough over and over again but again
A) this is mostly a recent thing, we are not looking over the last decade really
B) I'm not interested in talking about the top elite teams. Rather the teams that make up the league.
We are living in a significant time people, this will be an important thread to look back on in three years when the premier leagues financial gap is even bigger. At the moment I forsee a massive change in football because the finances in the prem are just getting out of control.
Maybe, maybe not. We have been saying it for the last 3 years or so, and top English teams are still goddamn awful. Each and every one of them have more money than 3 years ago, but they get repeatedly bitch slapped not only from Barca and Bayern, but even from the likes of PSG, City or dare I say Wolfsburg.
Obviously, EPL teams will get richer, but so will get the other teams too. Just cause EPL gets more money, that won't change the fact that Madrid, Barca, Bayern, PSG and co are getting more money too. All of those teams can spend as much as us, in addition to having quality young players from their leagues that they can get for free/cheap, something that doesn't exist in England because quality young players are very rare and cost a bomb.
I entirely agree that it's more competitive right now, there's no doubt about that. I just argue against the notion that it proves anything in regards to the quality of the teams in the bottom half of the table. For example, Wolfsburg are averaging so far less than 1.48 points per game in the league. That's about the same as Stoke in the Premier League. Leverkusen even less. If we accept the assumption that the Bundesliga teams are on average significantly weaker than the Premier League teams, it would mean that Stoke is playing on a signficantly higher level than these two sides. Well, that's silly whatever way you want to look at it.I think saying that it's the most competitive just means the level between all the entities is closer than in other leagues, and therefore most encounters (except against Villa
I wouldn't even disagree with the notion that Dortmund has it easier to beat the smaller clubs in the Bundesliga, if the reason put forward for it is the strength of Dortmund and the sensational form they're showing consistently throughout the season. If the reason put forward is that the rest of the league is a bit shit and it is implied that Dortmund isn't actually that good, I won't accept it though and I'll continue calling people out on it.
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Yeah I think what will happen is the European Elite will improve while the Premier League does as well in every position. It's going to be insane the amount of money in the game, and we'll see where that leaves everyone else.
And when they (English teams) get humiliated in Europe, you will use that as proof that EPL is the best and most competitive league in the world.
Yeah but then everyone realized you have no clue about any players outside of England and dismiss them on the basis of you not knowing them. 'If I don't know player X but I know Lee Cattermole, Lee Cattermole must be better' basically. Last year you'd have said Kante was a shit terrible idiot from Ligue 1.
I don't know enough about the rest of the Bundesliga in comparison to the PL but La Liga seems to me to be the best league around right now. It's got 3 top quality teams out of which 2 in terms of ability blow anything the PL offers out of the water. And the rest of the league is every bit as strong. They don't spend as much but they're just as strong in terms of quality and tactical strength.
What the PL has to do to match La Liga IMO is for its bigger teams to improve when it comes to how they are managed. I can see it happening with Pep, Mourinho, Klopp, Conte and Wenger all managing in the PL at the same time. So maybe we'll see the PL go toe to toe with la liga in the future. But as things stand, the latter is definitely better IMO.
What the PL has to do to match La Liga IMO is for its bigger teams to improve when it comes to how they are managed. I can see it happening with Pep, Mourinho, Klopp, Conte and Wenger all managing in the PL at the same time. So maybe we'll see the PL go toe to toe with la liga in the future. But as things stand, the latter is definitely better IMO.
Mate are you threaten me?
I got quite a few green smiley's for mocking you earlier in the thread. Sort of fits in well with the narrative imo.
But his brain is competing with stronger brains on this forum than it would be on other forums, therefore his brain is amazing.
I have no idea where this idea comes from.
mate, me neither, it's a mystery. It's not like you said the PL has more teams and those teams play more games than La Liga te... oh, ok.
But i... Didn't ?
Do you just not remember previous posts or something? Cause that would help explain a lot.
Your previous posts, you dismissed sides from La Liga and Bundesliga saying you don't know any of their players (Rayo).
Point a was in regard to the Bundesliga I later clarified that.
Honestly Cina your posts in this thread have been obnoxious you've broken the rules and you seem to be intent on getting laughs. Poor form
I know Rayo players. Manucho and Bebe in particular.
You literally said La Liga in the post I quoted.
so you know two of their squad players and on that basis you dismiss everyone else (because you don't know them). Good logic, keep it up.
I know they have four ex prem players in their squad. (Two of them combined to score against Barce the other day) I know those four players were poor premier league rejects. From there you can start to form an opinion.