I really think you're under estimating the change in the PL over just about the last decade. Now, don't get me wrong, the teams are not "better", it's that they are harder to beat, top to bottom. I've talked about this before, but there is such a marked difference between the way the game is played in England now, and how it is played in Germany, Spain and even Italy.
In Germany and Spain there is an optimistic openness to the game, even the shite teams try to play. As a result they tend to get blown apart by the really big teams. In England? Nobody plays like that, and worse, they now have the money to go out and buy the players tailor suited to the systems almost everyone runs against the stronger teams.
For lack of a better term, virtually all the mid table and lower teams play Mourinho ball, and they are backing it up with very direct, very athletic players. They tend to be very strong, fast and organized in defense and they are playing for the counter. They have very strong, direct forwards to exploit this, and they come straight at you. How is this different than say 7 years ago? The personnel has changed because the money is better.
I really think that Memphis is a perfect example of this. Memphis plays in the Dutch league and he is a physical monster, his athleticism complimented by his skills saw him tear that league apart. He comes to the premier league and he looks slow, pedestrian, awkward and clumsy at times. Now, I know that the Eredivisie isn't Germany or Spain, but the level of athleticism is more comparable between those three leagues than it is with England.
This isn't saying this wins you games, but it makes it VERY difficult for stronger teams to beat you. These teams are using the tried and true Mourinho style, and it's a style that can be summed up as "not playing to win, playing not to lose". As we've seen with the money the PL teams have to throw around, the quality of players that can succeed in that system is constantly increasing. It's a style that is designed to minimize risks, and exploit to the maximum degree any mistakes the other side make. It's a style that tends to get the most out of the players, it's very effective and the rest of Europe doesn't seem to have seen it adopted whole-sale in their leagues.
This doesn't mean that Madrid or Barcelona or Bayern München wouldn't come in and win the league here, it means that they'd have a harder time winning those games than normal, and they'd occasionally get done in by a bottom half team that parked the bus and exploited the counter.
