2 German and 2 French teams in the champs final. So much for farmer's league.
Are the premier league sides ahead of the rest of Europe these days
- Thread starter Posh Red
- Start date
Let's see the first person who will give the excuse of fatigue
This aged well..
On a serious that's often what PSG have to face or what Lyon used to face. The issue with french teams is inconsistency not that they can't beat anyone, you just have to look at what Rennes did last season against Arsenal and then what happened in the second leg, that's the price of having young talents instead of seasoned ones.
Edit: And Lyon beat City last season.
Thread aged well 
First time in 24 years without English or Spanish sides in the CL-semis.
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Could have gone either way tonight and when it counted Lyon were far more clinical, kudos.
Biased Pl fans and arrogant British media need to pipe down. The English clubs are nowhere near as good as these people think they are
The premier leegaue is the an expensive farmers league. Ovverated.
I get that we're fans of an English club and all, but why do these threads always pop up ever so often It always feels like they get proven wrong not long after as well
It always feels like they get proven wrong not long after as well
Up to United to restore some pride.
Of course. No need to count this weird, korona painted, season though.
Pointless posts. Cup competitions can end in any way, particularly if it is just one leg.
They showed the Liverpool v Athletic highlights on BT and realised Liverpool should have knocked them out with the dominance and shots, but it doesn't work that way.
Guardiola made a bad decision today weakening their strongest areas for defence. Stupid really. I think they would have won if they just chose their normal team, but they put themselves in a difficult position. Despite this, it still should have been 2-2. It is just the way it goes, but it doesn't reflect sttrength.
They showed the Liverpool v Athletic highlights on BT and realised Liverpool should have knocked them out with the dominance and shots, but it doesn't work that way.
Guardiola made a bad decision today weakening their strongest areas for defence. Stupid really. I think they would have won if they just chose their normal team, but they put themselves in a difficult position. Despite this, it still should have been 2-2. It is just the way it goes, but it doesn't reflect sttrength.
I'm glad to be honest, I've found the 2010s extremely boring in the CL. The last couple of seasons have been more varied it's made it more interesting. Although I'm not keen on one of PSG or Bayern winning but that's the way it's heading.
Here. Though in city's case it's down to guardiola being scared more than OL being much fitter(which they were)
And this bayern side were going to humiliate this barcelona side now, 5 months ago or next week
Yeah, Barca and Atletico going out had nothing to do with fatigue. City were unlucky and would have won had Sterling not missed that absolute sitter. Atalanta losing to PSG was also not caused by fatigue.
The circumstances are obviously far from ideal, but Spanish and English teams playing until 3 weeks ago was hardly the reason for their exits.
I felt there was an impression that English teams would be wearing the crown because the La Liga teams are in a serious decline but people forgot that trumping the Spanish teams doesn't mean you're automatically Europe's best.
Milk lasts longer than this thread
Last year it was PL in both finals. Just shows that it is pretty even near the top. One good manager or some luck can take you far.
Next year we could be the Lyon of the tournament.
Funny how I thought that French and German sides would struggle more due to not playing for very long. It turns out it is the opposite. Although the French cup finals did play out.
Next year we could be the Lyon of the tournament.
Funny how I thought that French and German sides would struggle more due to not playing for very long. It turns out it is the opposite. Although the French cup finals did play out.
It was always nonsense to suggest this. But this weird set of results shouldn't hide the fact that what the English teams have done is get back into the mix of the top sides in Europe. Bayern clearly look like Europe's best this season, but despite some bad results City and probably Liverpool too are a good match for the likes of Barca, Madrid, PSG, Juve et al. No nation is currently dominant the way the Spanish have been for a few years, and I don't get a sense that any nation is on the verge of becoming a dominant force, either. Which is good! The competition amongst the elite CL sides looks healthy, currently. Let's hope we can join them.
On the plus side - I guess United will have to carry the banner once more.
Hope that comment ages like wine and not milk.
Hope that comment ages like wine and not milk.
There's nothing to suggest City are too good for PSG and Juventus.
Yeah this thread backfired.
The way the Prem is propped up by the media as this entirely different level of football is sickening.
The way the Prem is propped up by the media as this entirely different level of football is sickening.
Fatigue definitely had a massive negative impact on Atalanta, and i think it was a big factor in Leipzig-Atletico as well
Which match did you watch? Pool had ZERO shots on target against Atletico in the second leg. They deserved to lose and they did.
The current tournament mode is even more flukey than usual, so it doesn't really say a lot.
France rule the football world. World champions and dominating CL!
There are some french players in both German teams, too.
Yeah, did not take too long to implode...
How many english players are left? I count it to none, but can have missed someone.
Not making excuses for the English teams as they have been rubbish in the Champions League this season. As for the French, firstly a dodgy offside call got Lyon in the lead. That’s what VAR is for. And a team with two strikers costing £400m scraping two last minutes goal against Atalanta. Still a farmers league.
More money means better quality players and more of them, and that will always win in the long term. Teams behind on money have less margin for error on coaching and hiring decisions.
OP must be thinking is it possible to delete threads
People here really need to have stronger convictions on leagues, rather than changing opinions if the ball goes in or out in a 1 game knockout format
The amount of excuses being thrown out for English and Spanish clubs is ridiculous, these same excuses would never be mentioned if it were happening to the opposite side.
Even before this week, there were people in the thread commenting on the Spurs v Leipzeg match defending Spurs by saying they had injuries, while disregarding the fact that Leipzeg played with 2 full backs and a 19 year old Ethan Ampadu in central defence because their three main center backs were all injured.
Now the excuse we are hearing is that the BL and Ligue 1 teams were fitter because they had massive breaks heading into the tournament. It's almost as if the century's long wisdom of having friendlies after end of season holidays is actually counter-intuitive because you're already magically fit if you haven't played football for 3 months! Maybe it's all just a scheme to make more ticket revenue.
I'm sure if it were the opposite situation, where EPL and La Liga finished their season earlier, then the excuses would've been that the EPL and La Liga teams came from long breaks and therefore weren't match fit. This would actually be a more reasonable reason. In fact, I remember in the BL thread people questioning whether Bayern would still be favourites for the UCL given that they would not play for over a month before the competition started again, I guess it was actually the opposite and Bayern were fitter than ever!
In the end, the La Liga and EPL are still the top 2 leagues in the world but the difference between them and the rest is mighty mighty small. There's still a delusion that we are in 2008 and the EPL is vastly superior to the rest, when in fact that has never been the case since 2010.
Even before this week, there were people in the thread commenting on the Spurs v Leipzeg match defending Spurs by saying they had injuries, while disregarding the fact that Leipzeg played with 2 full backs and a 19 year old Ethan Ampadu in central defence because their three main center backs were all injured.
Now the excuse we are hearing is that the BL and Ligue 1 teams were fitter because they had massive breaks heading into the tournament. It's almost as if the century's long wisdom of having friendlies after end of season holidays is actually counter-intuitive because you're already magically fit if you haven't played football for 3 months! Maybe it's all just a scheme to make more ticket revenue.
I'm sure if it were the opposite situation, where EPL and La Liga finished their season earlier, then the excuses would've been that the EPL and La Liga teams came from long breaks and therefore weren't match fit. This would actually be a more reasonable reason. In fact, I remember in the BL thread people questioning whether Bayern would still be favourites for the UCL given that they would not play for over a month before the competition started again, I guess it was actually the opposite and Bayern were fitter than ever!
In the end, the La Liga and EPL are still the top 2 leagues in the world but the difference between them and the rest is mighty mighty small. There's still a delusion that we are in 2008 and the EPL is vastly superior to the rest, when in fact that has never been the case since 2010.
English league is still top of the coefficients which indicates overall strength of the leagues. Although it’s close between the English, Spanish and German leagues this year. The surprising thing is that I think Germany could top the coefficients this year for the first time since 1990.
https://kassiesa.home.xs4all.nl/bert/uefa/data/method5/crank2020.html
https://www.uefa.com/memberassociations/uefarankings/country/#/yr/2020
First time since 1991 that there is no Italian, Spanish or English side in the CL semi finals either.
https://kassiesa.home.xs4all.nl/bert/uefa/data/method5/crank2020.html
https://www.uefa.com/memberassociations/uefarankings/country/#/yr/2020
First time since 1991 that there is no Italian, Spanish or English side in the CL semi finals either.
The main problem with some british fans is that they don't really watch other leagues but still judge them and they do it using name recognition. If you do that you don't realize that Getafe and Real Sociedad pre lockdown would have caused troubles to every teams that were in CL quarter finals this season and you don't realize that the main difference between the PL and other leagues is that midtable is more stable in the PL unlike what people think it's not as competitive, in Spain, France, Italy and Germany the group of good and decent teams change almost every years.
At the end of the day Ligue 1 is clearly the league with the most variance and therefore the weakest, a team can be very good for 3 or 4 months and poor after that, that phenomenon is also true for the Bundesliga and Serie A but not as pronounced while La Liga and the PL are more stable, the good teams are good for a lengthy period of time and are rarely properly challenged. And yes it's a weird thing to say when PSG, Bayern and Juventus win every year but these three teams only represents a small portion of the leagues and they are genuinely good, they are not good because the rest of the league is somehow poor.
So the gap exists between leagues but it's not as big as some people think, we are not talking about the gap between the NBA and the Euroleague. It's more comparable to the gap between rugby union leagues where there is a hierarchy but none of the top 4 leagues are poor, they are all good and their top teams can beat anyone.
At the end of the day Ligue 1 is clearly the league with the most variance and therefore the weakest, a team can be very good for 3 or 4 months and poor after that, that phenomenon is also true for the Bundesliga and Serie A but not as pronounced while La Liga and the PL are more stable, the good teams are good for a lengthy period of time and are rarely properly challenged. And yes it's a weird thing to say when PSG, Bayern and Juventus win every year but these three teams only represents a small portion of the leagues and they are genuinely good, they are not good because the rest of the league is somehow poor.
So the gap exists between leagues but it's not as big as some people think, we are not talking about the gap between the NBA and the Euroleague. It's more comparable to the gap between rugby union leagues where there is a hierarchy but none of the top 4 leagues are poor, they are all good and their top teams can beat anyone.
This random school of thought that the PL is the best league in the world has come from the fact that it has six supposed “top teams”. In actual fact, Arsenal and Spurs are shit, us and Chelsea are in huge transition, City are decent but extremely overrated and inconsistent, and Liverpool are good.
One wonders why we’ve only had two winners since we did it in 2008, when we were the best team and the PL was really the best league in the world. Now, it’s just equal to the Bundesliga and La Liga.
One wonders why we’ve only had two winners since we did it in 2008, when we were the best team and the PL was really the best league in the world. Now, it’s just equal to the Bundesliga and La Liga.