European teams - new opinion?

[AlgarveBlu]

watching and listening to football pundits over the last decade you would think that the premier league is by far the best league on the planet and the european teams (apart from Barcelona) are generally poor. The amount of times I've heard the 'recovering ( insert vice of choice) addict' on soccer saturday slag off Italian football is beyond belief.

Question is - what will they say when the team that has been ripping nearly all before them this season goes out at the first stage ? and you'd have to say desevedlly at this point..

It's a mixture of arrogance and ignorance in my opinion...

 

[StMark's]

Re: European teams -new opinion?

1) We've not gone out yet.

2) Don't remember anyone say we would walk this group when the draw was made.

 

[Deleted member 14625]

Re: European teams -new opinion?

The Premier League is nowhere near the high level of competition people in this country think it is. Pundits, journos and fans have all said many times about how poor La Liga is past the big two and two or three others. But then think back to how Santander ripped us a new arsehole a few years ago when they were fifth from bottom in La Liga and that will outline how wrong that is. Many have said how Serie A is on the decline, but i think all the best young players in Europe over the last few years all play in that league. Yes i actually think some of the defending in the Bundesliga is Championship standard, but even then there are some very high quality teams in that league.

What gets me about English teams is that we change the way we play in the Prem to how we play Europe. When we play with a typical English fast tempo (i do not mean kick and rush, there is a huge difference!) in Europe, English teams generally do well - think back to Boro and Fulham in the UEFA and United and Liverpool too. Many European teams cannot live with us at a high tempo. But too often we play a slow possession game - which doesn't suit us - against teams who love to defend all game every game against that type of footy. (i also don't mean throw caution to the wind and go for it, you can defend on the edge of your own box - like 7 or 8 Prem teams do away from home every week - and still play in a high tempo style).

 

[intheknow!]

Re: European teams -new opinion?

Sorry but I don't believe Napoli are a better team than us. Mancini is not a good manager in the Champions League competition, end of! He's never had success in the Champions League with any of the teams he has managed, that's why he was sacked from Inter. Mancini will probably win us the Prem and a couple of tin pot Trophy's but the big prize- no!

 

[AlgarveBlu]

Re: European teams -new opinion?

1) point taken... but the odds are against us

2) I was making a general point that the media put down all the other european leagues and overly hype the premier league...Obviously I understand why Sky do it...How many times do you hear the sentance 'the best league in the world' - is it?

 

[Prestwich_Blue]

Re: European teams -new opinion?

The Premier League is nowhere near the high level of competition people in this country think it is.

Thought the same the other day. If you look at the points spread in Serie A, there are 12 points between top and the team just outside the relegation zone. In the PL there are 12 between us and the team just outside the top 4.

So either the Italian teams are all crap or they're much more balanced competitively and i don't think it's the former.

 

[intheknow!]

Re: European teams -new opinion?

The Premier League is nowhere near the high level of competition people in this country think it is. Pundits, journos and fans have all said many times about how poor La Liga is past the big two and two or three others. But then think back to how Santander ripped us a new arsehole a few years ago when they were fifth from bottom in La Liga and that will outline how wrong that is. Many have said how Serie A is on the decline, but i think all the best young players in Europe over the last few years all play in that league. Yes i actually think some of the defending in the Bundesliga is Championship standard, but even then there are some very high quality teams in that league.

What gets me about English teams is that we change the way we play in the Prem to how we play Europe. When we play with a typical English fast tempo (i do not mean kick and rush, there is a huge difference!) in Europe, English teams generally do well - think back to Boro and Fulham in the UEFA and United and Liverpool too. Many European teams cannot live with us at a high tempo. But too often we play a slow possession game - which doesn't suit us - against teams who love to defend all game every game against that type of footy. (i also don't mean throw caution to the wind and go for it, you can defend on the edge of your own box - like 7 or 8 Prem teams do away from home every week - and still play in a high tempo style).

You are sooo right. Tottenham played 'English style' (NOT kick and rush, long ball) but fast, high tempo, attacking etc, in the Champions League last season and they won their group and went all the way to the Quarter finals. Then they lost heavily to Real Madrid but Madrid and Barca are on another planet and Mourinho knows how to win against English teams.

 

[Aequitas1987]

Re: European teams -new opinion?

This is what the fans of all the leagues feel that other fans should act like.

<a class="postlink" href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S3E5vYNzrds&feature=related" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S3E5vYNz ... re=related</a>

This is the year where the Serie A is finally starting to come back to its previous glory days with teams like Juventus, Udinese and Napoli doing well and keeping the milan giants competitive. However, they are still a long way off retaining their spot to the Bundesliga who will soon overtake the La Liga as well.

The EPL and the Bundesliga are the two best leagues in the world because they are the most competitive. However, the Bundesliga has a long-term foundation that makes it immune to FFP, has the youth academies to sustain their pool of players for the long term and unlike the EPL is also very much tactically equivalent to Serie A.

 

[pee dubya]

I think a lot of it stems from the failure of players from these league when they come to English football.

For example, the likes of Dossena, great for Napoli, rubbish at Liverpool.

So many foreign players with good reputations at their clubs come to the Premier League and flunk, therefor it appears as though these players are of a lower quality or the other leagues are easier to play in.

It's difficult to make the vice versa comparison because the money (and culture) in English football means very few players who build their careers from the beginning here then go on to make a move abroad.

Although it's possible to realistically loosely rank them based on European competitions, i think the reality is it's just different, which leagues are best is more of a subjective thing, determined by personal taste.

 

[cibaman]

I think there have been two reasons why we've struggled in the CL

1) Silva has not been as effective as in the PL. That seems to have been due to a combination of a) him trying too hard to beat too many men and b) the defenders we've faced being more comfortable facing him

2) The teams we've played being much better at raising their game at the right time to take advantage of lulls in our play. In nearly every game this season we've had dodgy spells of 15-20min when we've looked vulnerable. In the PL we've got through those spells unpunished, except at Fulham. In the CL teams have stepped up a gear and punished us.

In the first game against Napoli we dominated for 70 mins but had that 20 min spell when you could see that their goal was coming. In Munich we started well, took our foot off the gas and were suddenly 2 down. Villareal capitalised on our usual slow start. And yesterday Napoli hit back at us after a bright start and also took advantage of our post half time slumber.