How about clubs from Spain winning against sides from Premier League????
The relative strength of the Premier League
- Thread starter Wumminator
- Start date
How about clubs from Spain winning against sides from Premier League????
When Wumminator started this thread, the PL was basically crap. They has been a long essay in the famous German tactic blog “Spielverlagerung” highlighting why the PL has been horrible between 2013 and 2017. Ancient tactics, to much power for the managers, no professional structure...
It took me a while to find it ((https://spielverlagerung.com/2014/11/21/the-problem-with-english-football/))
At the top things have changed. Liverpool and City are up with Europeans best but at the bottom it is still the same old story. Every lower table team has still better players than their counterparts in Germany and Spain, but they are still playing worse football.
I personally don’t like most of English football. Sometime even Top teams are abandoning the ball and sitting in their box doing basically nothing.
It took me a while to find it ((https://spielverlagerung.com/2014/11/21/the-problem-with-english-football/))
At the top things have changed. Liverpool and City are up with Europeans best but at the bottom it is still the same old story. Every lower table team has still better players than their counterparts in Germany and Spain, but they are still playing worse football.
I personally don’t like most of English football. Sometime even Top teams are abandoning the ball and sitting in their box doing basically nothing.
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Which ones?
if Serie A is so good, why does it have zero UCL or Europa League titles in 11 years?
How does the press in Spain or Italy report the prem compared to their own leagues? Maybe, just maybe, every major footballing nation focuses on, and hypes up their own domestic league.
But looking at la liga, bundesliga and serie a, not much really jumps out as being a huge surprise at this stage in the season. The leagues also don't look as compressed as the prem is at he moment where second to 9th is separated by 5 points.
A lot of talk recently about ManCity extending their unbeaten run to 17 games if they beat Arsenal today. Correct me if I'm wrong but I think this is the Iongest domestic winstreak ever for Guardiola.
I wonder what the PL hypemen a la @Wumminator make of the fact that Guardiola has never had such a long unbeaten run with any team in any league? It kinda goes against the narrative of how close and challenging each game is, doesn't it?
Don't want to recycle the same old arguments we have read many times in this thread but I'm genuinely curious as to what you make of that, as some posters are excellent at twisting in turning arguments to suit a certain narrative.
I wonder what the PL hypemen a la @Wumminator make of the fact that Guardiola has never had such a long unbeaten run with any team in any league? It kinda goes against the narrative of how close and challenging each game is, doesn't it?
Don't want to recycle the same old arguments we have read many times in this thread but I'm genuinely curious as to what you make of that, as some posters are excellent at twisting in turning arguments to suit a certain narrative.
City are a truly special side and what they're doing in no way changes the fact the PL is currently by far the strongest league in the world
I mean Man City are an absolutely phenomenal team who are capable of that. Despite that they’ve been close in a lot of games.
You look at the other big clubs in the world at the moment and I think it’s feasible that 6 of the top 11 teams in the world are in the prem.
Will City get the Quadruple?
After 5 years of joining this Forum I am prepared to say it officially. It's currently the best League in the world. What I don't know is if the second one is still La Liga or if Serie A is already better.
La Liga has dropped off in a big way. I would say Serie A is probably stronger these days, but more for the fact that it's competitive and a lot of teams are on a similar level.
I actually also think Ligue A in France is a bit underrated as well; it's a lot better than it used to be.
It's the Bundesliga actually
La Liga has fallen off and Serie A is possibly the league that was hit the hardest by COVID. On fact, Ligue1 might be better than both right now
One could argue he had even better teams at Bayern and Barcelona at his disposal and still couldn't do it. You keep banging on about the competetiveness of the PL, yet in the last 3 seasons the Champions went on record breaking winning streaks, surely something you wouldnt expect judging by your comments.
For the record: The PL is currently the best IMO, but things only started to change with the influx of top managers. One could even argue it was the worst league for a long period of time from a tactical point of view.
Don't think anybody can deny that English Premier League is by far the best league in the world, especially after tonight's Atletico-Chelsea
La Liga and Serie A embarassing so far, Bundesliga better than both leagues but that Leipzig - Liverpool 0-2 show that PL simply is on another level (waiting for BMG - Manchester City tomorrow)
La Liga and Serie A embarassing so far, Bundesliga better than both leagues but that Leipzig - Liverpool 0-2 show that PL simply is on another level (waiting for BMG - Manchester City tomorrow)
Atletico were fecking wank.
I don’t watch la liga on a regular basis but based on that ‘performance’ they would struggle to make top4.
I don’t watch la liga on a regular basis but based on that ‘performance’ they would struggle to make top4.
TBF anything can happen in one off games. It’s why the CL isn’t always the best barometer.
Agreed and I’m not going overboard on it but I would have thought the team currently ahead of both Barca and real were a bit better than that.
Perhaps it was a bad day at the office.it’s not like Chelsea are all that either.
It told you a lot about the state of La Liga when Bayern absolutely humiliated Atletico in the group stage while the latter was leading the league.
They're not better than barcelona or real madrid though, not in the way that matters in CL
so when Lyon beat city and Atletico beat Liverpool was PL wank last year? Because this is the weakest PL since 2016
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Good point. I’m not sure how people come up with these unshakable certainties with no evidence whatsoever
Firm no.
Bookies have them at 10/1 to do it.
Them eclipsing our treble would be fecking hell. Praying Bayern or PSG can stop them in the CL.
You think the #1 team in La Liga now will fail to make top 4 in EPL?
If they play like that every week then yes.
French teams had holidays for three or four months, Bundesliga finished three weeks before PL... Definitely wouldn't count "Champions League" of last summer.
Obviously PL clearly being the best league in the world (and has been for 2-3 seasons already) doesn't fit some people's narrative that "City can run away only because the league's so weak now and 00s was the golden era".
City winning anything means feck all. It's a hollow victory. They could win the World Cup and it would mean nothing to me. Liverpool winning the Carabao Cup, however, would annoy me.
Being "the best league in the world" is disconnected to the strength of the league currently. It can still be the best league currently just because the others are weak, and could also not have been the absolute best in the 00s because other leagues were more competitive. Also being "the best league in the world" is so relative - is it because of the overall strength of the 20 teams? (which you could make a case for now, with the traditional big clubs being challenged) Is it having very strong top teams? In which case the 00s were brutal. It's also a very strange season in itself - I'm not saying it shouldn't be considered of course, but I don't think massive conclusions can be taken, with how different things are: no crowds, intense schedule which will favour teams with big squads, the weird beginning of the season with teams not beginning at the same time, getting little to no pre-season and shortened breaks, matches being called off because of Covid...
00's is referenced so much because it was so competitive. Add in PL teams didn't used to get a winter break as well and it's actually amazing when you think from 04/05 to 11/12 there was a PL team in the CL final every year bar one. City are just unlucky in a sense that when they were being taken over and building for the future, United, Liverpool and Arsenal were bought by owners whose first priority is to make money.
Now you have a situation where the European giants City should be competing with are in turmoil and, with covid, you basically have Bayern and maybe PSG who look like they could give you a game. No surprises it's City's carbon copy in PSG and then the BL's dominant team here either.
@Wumminator was right all along ya haters, just took half a decade for this thread to be justified.
Jokes aside, the decline of La Liga is really something else. What happened? I know that Barca has been in a slump for a while and the same was to be expected with Real after being in transition but what surprises me how crap the other teams have looked in Europe. Sevilla really shouldnt lose to an out of form Dortmund and United had difficult weeks as well but brushed Sociedad aside like nothing.
Jokes aside, the decline of La Liga is really something else. What happened? I know that Barca has been in a slump for a while and the same was to be expected with Real after being in transition but what surprises me how crap the other teams have looked in Europe. Sevilla really shouldnt lose to an out of form Dortmund and United had difficult weeks as well but brushed Sociedad aside like nothing.
I grew up when the Italian League was the best in the world, in those times when football was still football, I followed several leagues around the world.
Today, in a different world, there is the Premier League, the rest is so far away and in ruins ...
The formula is relatively simple, although it is far from perfect, more equitable distribution of revenues than in the Southern European leagues.
Attracting the best coaches and players, made Premier the most competitive league, the most entertaining.
Yesterday, for example, it was much more fun to see Leeds-Southampton than the 2 Champions League games.
La Liga rotted away by the mistakes that destroyed so many other leagues, an absurd polarization, a desert of quality and competitiveness.
Today, in a different world, there is the Premier League, the rest is so far away and in ruins ...
The formula is relatively simple, although it is far from perfect, more equitable distribution of revenues than in the Southern European leagues.
Attracting the best coaches and players, made Premier the most competitive league, the most entertaining.
Yesterday, for example, it was much more fun to see Leeds-Southampton than the 2 Champions League games.
La Liga rotted away by the mistakes that destroyed so many other leagues, an absurd polarization, a desert of quality and competitiveness.
Bayern the best side in the world. City second next to PSG. Then it is pretty open and Spanish league is on a decline.
City are levels above PSG imo
The key difference is most other leagues are geared to suit the top clubs in the league. In England, the top clubs do not get preferential treatment.
I think City would beat Bayern this season.
I think City probably are the best team in europe at the moment.
It helps that they are used to playing in a empty stadium.
We say this every year and they always find a daft way to go out. Of course sooner or later a time will come when that doesn't happen.
There is no doubt the PL is and will be the best league for many years. IT is not even a question / worth a discussion. It is also out of the question that the main reason is the huge financial gap to other leagues. Even the last place team of the PL gets 100m+ , the same amount what Bayern gets. Last place in Germany gets like 40m. The 50+1 rule also prevents the entry of investors like in many PL teams.. City became from a midtable team to a european juggernaut overnight bascially. Even the EFL Championship is full of foreign investors.
So many top players from the Bundesliga went to the PL for obvious reasons. Bundesliga losing top player to PL is comparable to Bundesliga teams losing some players to Bayern ( although Bayern haven't really weakened the rivals in the last 4/5 years). Also, Upamecano and Lewandowski would have left to another top team 100% even if Bayern wouldn't approach them.
So many top players from the Bundesliga went to the PL for obvious reasons. Bundesliga losing top player to PL is comparable to Bundesliga teams losing some players to Bayern ( although Bayern haven't really weakened the rivals in the last 4/5 years). Also, Upamecano and Lewandowski would have left to another top team 100% even if Bayern wouldn't approach them.
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They've saved a fortune not advertising free tickets as well.
There is some truth to this, especially when you look at TV money - it is much more evenly distributed in the PL than in the Bundesliga, which makes it difficult for the smaller clubs to improve their level much.
Obviously it still is possible when you see Freiburg or Union Berlin giving Gladbach or Dortmund a real fight for the spots, or the third-highest revenue (Schalke) being dead last, but this is due to having great (or exceptionally bad) management, that has to overcome (or waste) a much higher gap in economical power than PL clubs have to do.
And City may well be the best team in the world, but they will just not win the CL (at least not with Pep). He makes mistakes every year in the CL and seems to be too stubborn to learn from it.