The relative strength of the Premier League

Berbasbullet said:
True :lol: its nice that the German defence league all stick together though. Maybe they can all hold hands and sing a song when Bayern win the league again and pick off the best players in the league?
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:lol:

I am German and i just hate the Bundesliga. Even in the mid 00's when Bayern was shit the league wasn't exciting to watch. The level back then was just so so bad. The only exciting period the Bundesliga had in recent times was when Klopps Dortmund challenged Bayern for 2 years.
Germany is a football obsessed country but the league just isn't all that. I think deep down every german fan knows this and they all have kind of a minority complex because of that.
I remember when we won the world cup and in every german sports show that covered the Bundesliga they called it the "world champion league (Weltmeisterliga)".
Also Bayern and Dortmund were in the CL final that year and all the german "experts" were absolutely sure that the Bundesliga is the best league in the world altough teams other than Dortmund and Bayern were losing games vs teams like Rijeka in the Euro League.

I also absolute hate how they all cheer for their rivals in european games just so they can talk their league strong.
So I stopped watching the Bundesliga and posting in german forums altogether and almost exclusively watch the Premier League since then.
Now i finally found a nice non german forum here just to see the same Bundesliga fans with minority complex praising their league and cheering for their rivals. I even saw a Schalke fan defending Dortmund in one of the threads in the football forum :wenger:
 
stefan92 said:
Yeah we now how bad our league is - so what is the runaway leader of YOUR league doing against Dortmund who won't even play CL next season? :p;)
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Winning? That's the name of the game right, Outscore your opponent?

Edit:
I take your point though, Dortmund gave City more problems than most of the PL has managed. Apart from United of course who just love to turn City over on their own turf ;)
 
50% of the teams in European semi finals are English.
 
It is clearly the strongest league. Although the gap is not as big as people think I say.

Lots of decent teams in europe I think. The overall quality is very high. Suprisingly high due to Covid I expected the quality to drop more.
 
Jonno said:
This is the strongest I’ve seen English sides since what... 2008/2009?
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Nah the rest of Europe is considerably weaker than during that period. There’s still no team currently in the prem anywhere near that Utd 08 side.
 
TrustInJanuzaj said:
Nah the rest of Europe is considerably weaker than during that period. There’s still no team currently in the prem anywhere near that Utd 08 side.
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Depends on the season. 07/08 rest of europe was weaker than this season for example

As for this season's general unimpressiveness: COVID
 
Right.

Something needs to happen very soon to curtail the domination of the prem. With Sancho, Varane, Lukaku etc joining the league this summer; the prem is going to pull away even more. A combined league between Italy/Spain/Germany seems inevitable to me at some point.
 
I mean Barca reported wage cap next season is going to be about the same as Everton’s wage bill, I think that says it’s all.

Right now the premier league are the only league in the world who have any capacity to spend. Though I would say most of the money being spent is either from owners, or been spent and in tandem with increasing the clubs debt.

The difference between the premier league and other leagues is while all clubs are basically living if there credit cards at the moment, premier league clubs havnt quite maxed out the amount of debt they can get away with racking up without crumbling and in other league most clubs have already hit that point.
 
All the leagues have some weak ass lower half teams that is no where near as fun or as competitive to watch as the PL.

Leicester City winning the PL was a sign at how top clubs can be inconsistent and a team can come out and win from nowhere.

I mean look at Aston Villa - buying some quality players from good clubs and starting to target higher achievements.

It's never really seen it in other leagues - it's why I've de-rated players who have not given this league a go; the last time a league was this competitive for me was the Serie A during the early 90's.
 
Wumminator said:
Right.

Something needs to happen very soon to curtail the domination of the prem. With Sancho, Varane, Lukaku etc joining the league this summer; the prem is going to pull away even more. A combined league between Italy/Spain/Germany seems inevitable to me at some point.
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Insane. This moves in cycles. Serie A in the 90s, La liga 2000s and no one talked about combining leagues. Overreaction
 
Stacks said:
Insane. This moves in cycles. Serie A in the 90s, La liga 2000s and no one talked about combining leagues. Overreaction
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Well, not really. The standard of football is not as good as it has historically been all around Europe, which is a shame. However, the answer isn't to build some weird super League, the answer is for the likes of the German, French, Spanish and Italian leagues to look at what the Prem gets right in terms of marketing, division of prize money etc and try to emulate or even improve on it.

If you look at the laughably bad administration of the game in Spain in recent years from the top clubs all the way to the league itself (see as an example their appalling new deal they want to broker to sell of 10% of their TV rights for the next 50 years for a one off fee of only about £2.5bn or something), that is clearly the problem in Spain right now. They need to dismantle the edifice and rebuild it on a sustainable footing.

On the other hand a Benelux league could make sense. They are very geographically close and easily accessible to each other and it would probably improve standards and return a financial reward as well due to more interest and better collective bargaining power.
 
TwoSheds said:
Well, not really. The standard of football is not as good as it has historically been all around Europe, which is a shame. However, the answer isn't to build some weird super League, the answer is for the likes of the German, French, Spanish and Italian leagues to look at what the Prem gets right in terms of marketing, division of prize money etc and try to emulate or even improve on it.

If you look at the laughably bad administration of the game in Spain in recent years from the top clubs all the way to the league itself (see as an example their appalling new deal they want to broker to sell of 10% of their TV rights for the next 50 years for a one off fee of only about £2.5bn or something), that is clearly the problem in Spain right now. They need to dismantle the edifice and rebuild it on a sustainable footing.

On the other hand a Benelux league could make sense. They are very geographically close and easily accessible to each other and it would probably improve standards and return a financial reward as well due to more interest and better collective bargaining power.
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Benelux what's that? I think PSG should just join the EPL. Paris is closer to London than Newcastle.
 
It's definitely worrying time for the other leagues, the PL is very close to become the NBA of football.
 
La Liga's waiting if Real can sign Mbappe otgerwise their biggest stars are has beens like Griezmann, Bale, fat Hazard and old Benzema. Ligue 1 has their Harlem Globetrotters but the rest can't even generare funds through sales anymore (Depay, Aouar, Camavinga) and Bundesliga will be relevant for one more year but when Haaland leaves what's left? Just Bayern hoping Lewa, Muller and Neuer can perform for at least 2-3 more years. Seria A could have been more fun but after Inter lost Conte and their best players (Lautaro next summer?) and with Allegri back I expect Juve to win with 10+ points gap again.

Clearly that gap between Premier League and the rest will only grow bigger and bigger over next few years.
 
I think it's too simple to think of this in terms of cycles, as if the relative strength of leagues waxed and waned in accordance with some underlying and immutable dynamic. Things happen for specific reasons, not because there's some cycle in play.

As long as the level of the football and the management expertise is roughly similar among the major leagues, I think it's reasonable to assume money will be the main dividing factor. The advantage of the PL over the others is their much larger TV revenue, which right now, after 18 months of pandemic and little to no match going revenue, is an advantage that is hugely magnified. As such, it's very natural that the PL's position of advantage is unprecedented. The reopening of stadiums will in itself move the pendulum some way back. Still, there can be little question that no other league is as competitive as the PL right now.
 
People are very quick to write off the by far most successful teams of the past two decades. Barca and Madrid are still behemoths in terms of both prestige and revenue.

Moreover, one can argue that the EPL didn't have an a top 5 player in the world since Hazard left Chelsea. The best players of the past rarely played in England and it doesn't seem like this ist about to really change.
 
Wumminator said:
The cycles were before one league had complete financial dominance.
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Serie A did in the 90s. Bayern Munich have caught on and starting to become more global so other teams will follow suit.
Idxomer said:
It's definitely worrying time for the other leagues, the PL is very close to become the NBA of football.
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No its not. The best players in the world very rarely even play in the EPL
Pep's Suit said:
La Liga's waiting if Real can sign Mbappe otgerwise their biggest stars are has beens like Griezmann, Bale, fat Hazard and old Benzema. Ligue 1 has their Harlem Globetrotters but the rest can't even generare funds through sales anymore (Depay, Aouar, Camavinga) and Bundesliga will be relevant for one more year but when Haaland leaves what's left? Just Bayern hoping Lewa, Muller and Neuer can perform for at least 2-3 more years. Seria A could have been more fun but after Inter lost Conte and their best players (Lautaro next summer?) and with Allegri back I expect Juve to win with 10+ points gap again.

Clearly that gap between Premier League and the rest will only grow bigger and bigger over next few years.
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Bayern are at the top earners in revenue. I think they make more than United.
Zehner said:
People are very quick to write off the by far most successful teams of the past two decades. Barca and Madrid are still behemoths in terms of both prestige and revenue.

Moreover, one can argue that the EPL didn't have an a top 5 player in the world since Hazard left Chelsea. The best players of the past rarely played in England and it doesn't seem like this ist about to really change.
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Indeed.
 
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Stacks said:
Serie A did in the 90s. Bayern Munich have caught on and starting to become more global so other teams will follow suit.

No its not. The best players in the world very rarely even play in the NBA

Bayern are at the top earners in revenue. I think they make more than United.

Indeed.
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The best players in the world rarely even play in the NBA? Please do explain.
 
Zehner said:
People are very quick to write off the by far most successful teams of the past two decades. Barca and Madrid are still behemoths in terms of both prestige and revenue.

Moreover, one can argue that the EPL didn't have an a top 5 player in the world since Hazard left Chelsea. The best players of the past rarely played in England and it doesn't seem like this ist about to really change.
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The “top five” might not play in England; most of 6-200 will.

that’s the issue going forward.
 
Ralf Ragnick has come out and said the bottom three teams here will be nowhere near the bottom of the Bundesliga.
The gap is growing.
 
Wumminator said:
Ralf Ragnick has come out and said the bottom three teams here will be nowhere near the bottom of the Bundesliga.
The gap is growing.
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he’s right. under current rulesets, none of the premier league teams would be eligible to compete in the budesliga.
 
Wumminator said:
Ralf Ragnick has come out and said the bottom three teams here will be nowhere near the bottom of the Bundesliga.
The gap is growing.
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When did he say that? When he had a win against the 18th ranked team talking his team up? I give you Fürth - but Stuttgart when Kalajdzic and Silas are back I do not want to play against when they are in song. And Bielefeld just won 2:0 away in Leipzig - on their day all of this teams are not easy to play...

In Germany - apart from Fürth - the difference between midtable and lower end is much tighter than in the EPL.
 
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