Post by g7vikings on Feb 27, 2014 13:35:46 GMT
Rory Smith of The Times has took a throw away comment and turned it into quite a fun article, which centers around a debate many of us have had at least a thousand times.
Using his theory, which league is the best in the world?
My results came out almost identical to his. Bundesliga 6, PL 5, La Liga 4, Serie A 4. I've no idea which group I missed out but I cba doing it again.
Using his theory, which league is the best in the world?
My results came out almost identical to his. Bundesliga 6, PL 5, La Liga 4, Serie A 4. I've no idea which group I missed out but I cba doing it again.
“We’re brainwashed into thinking the Premier League is the best league in the world. Nonsense. Best brand, maybe.” Roy Keane, firebrand
“Who is the best Lord? Lord of the Rings, Lord of the Flies, Lord of the Dance?” Alan Partridge, homeowner
There are certain conventions when it comes to Champions League nights on ITV. Some have fallen by the wayside, like Sir Alex Ferguson ending his post-match interviews with “well done”. Others endure, like the widespread assumption that everyone watching wants the English team to win.
This was perfectly witnessed at the end of Manchester United’s defeat to Olympiacos on Tuesday, when viewers were told that “we all hope they can turn it round in the second leg”, which must have come as a surprise to Manchester City, Liverpool and Leeds United supporters, at the very least.
Increasingly, though, the great certainty of any ITV football broadcast is that, at the end, Roy Keane will say something deeply inflammatory. In what remains a relatively young punditry career, he has already laid into Nani, Ireland’s habit of turning up at international tournaments for the craic and even, heretically, Vincent Kompany, the Manchester City captain who seems to have been nominated A Good Guy by the football fraternity, based largely on the fact that he tweets about politics sometimes.
There is a sense with Keane, now, that he is doing it on purpose, that he is playing a character just as much as Chiles (Man On Street), Lee Dixon (#tactics) and Gareth Southgate (Kind-Hearted PE Teacher In Troubled School). He has worked out he is good television, and he is playing to his audience.
Among all the fire-starting, though, Keane also found time to damn the Barclays Premier League’s claim to being the best domestic competition in the world.
Regular readers – if there is such a thing – will be aware that this is a debate which some of us find somewhat strange. Not only is there a ring of Alan Partridge to it – “What is the best league? The League of Nations, the Human League, or the Premier League?” – but it also creates an unnecessary schism, as detailed here.
That is not the only issue with the best league debate, as it is currently framed. There is also the fact that nobody quite seems to know what the criteria are. They seem, in this country at least, to shift and warp depending on what the Premier League is like at the moment.
There have been times when it is the number of teams in the title race, or success in the Champions League, or the gap between third and fourth. All of these are somewhat spurious – though not so much as the slack-jawed belief that small teams only ever beat big teams in England – and none of them provide a satisfactory answer.
Yes, more teams in England – six – start the year believing they can win the title. But more teams in Spain start the season believing they can get in the Champions League, because there are fewer teams aiming for the title. Which is better? A larger closed shop, or a smaller, but more open one?
Or is neither of these relevant? Maybe the best gauge of a league is its midpoint: how good is the team that finished tenth? Or is it only as strong as its weakest link? All are vaguely explicable; none are wholly convincing.
However. There was always going to be a however. It is quite a big however, and involves an uncomfortable amount of self-promotion, so bear with it. There is a more scientific way of establishing this fact. It is one that seems enormously fantastical, a flight of ridiculous fancy, but if you stop to think about, it could genuinely work. It is this:
At the end of next season*, 2014/15, when there is no major European or global competition, a tournament is held. Teams from the Premier League, the Bundesliga, Serie A and La Liga are invited. Each one plays in a round robin group against those sides who finished in the same position as them in the other leagues. So the champions of England, Spain, Italy and Germany play in one group, as do the runners-up, right the way down to teams who finished bottom.
For the sake of convenience – and, more importantly, money – each team only plays three games, because the groups are not conducted on a home-and-away basis. Instead, they are staged on neutral grounds, in host cities across the world. These cities, if necessary, could be paired by geographical proximity – Abu Dhabi and Dubai, Bangkok and Singapore, New York and Boston – to ensure the best facilities.
Each city or each pair would host two groups: one from the top of the tables, one from the bottom**. This should guarantee at least a sprinkling of stardust for each host; one of the very many problems with the Premier League’s 39th game was always that, no matter how good your marketing, nobody in Tokyo wants to watch Stoke against Hull City. Very few people anywhere want to watch Stoke against Hull City.
The cities would have to bid, potentially, to host games, but far more important is that by ensuring a global spread, you would access not only a vast number of match-going fans, but every major television market. The rights would be lucrative, and shared between the leagues. Not Uefa, the leagues, and straight down to the clubs.
So, let’s say we have our top group, based on current positions. Chelsea, Bayern Munich, Real Madrid and Juventus; their group would be staged in Shanghai and Hong Kong, and it would be paired with the bottom group – Fulham, Real Betis, Sassuolo and (because there are only 18 teams in the Bundesliga) Greuter Furth, currently second in Bundesliga II.
Over the course of three match-days, each team would play the others in their group once. That’s it. Three extra games, for all of that lovely television revenue, all of that merchandising, all of that brand-building. The winner of the group would claim a point for their league. It could be split in the case of a dead heat. At the end of the three match-days – over a week, maybe two – the league with the most points would win. That league would then have a fairly convincing claim to being the strongest of the four.
This is pie-in-the-sky stuff, of course, but it raises an interesting issue. It would be even more far-fetched to start suggesting who would win***, so let’s go no further than simply – on the basis of current standings – listing the groups.
We have already seen that Chelsea, Real, Juventus and Bayern make up the first. Just as appealing is Arsenal, Barcelona, Roma and Bayer Leverkusen, as well as Manchester City, Atletico Madrid, Borussia Dortmund and Napoli. The fourth group would be made up of Liverpool, Athletic Bilbao, Fiorentina and Schalke, followed by Tottenham, Villarreal, Inter Milan and Wolfsburg.
Sixth is Manchester United, Real Sociedad, Hellas Verona – Italy’s surprise package - and Borussia Mönchengladbach. Everton would face Sevilla, Parma and Hertha BSC, while Newcastle would take on Valencia, Torino and Augsburg, punching above their weight in the Bundesliga. Southampton would be in with Levante, Mainz and, more attractively, Milan.
The mid-point is West Ham, Espanyol, Lazio and Hoffenheim, who would have their games paired with a group made up of Hull, Celta Vigo, Genoa and Hannover. Swansea, Osasuna, Udinese and Nuremburg are next, before Aston Villa, Granada, Sampdoria and Eintracht Frankfurt and Norwich, Elche, Atalanta and Werder Bremen.
A group of Stoke, Getafe, Cagliari and Stuttgart may not sound like much of a proposition to a foreign audience, but the pairing system means it could effectively function as an undercard. Likewise Crystal Palace, Almeria, Chievo Verona and Hamburg, as well as West Brom, Malaga, Bologna and Freiburg and Sunderland, Valladolid, Livorno and Eintracht Braunschweig.
This brings one more complication – the Bundesliga are out of teams – but if we bring in Kaiserslautern, leaders of the German second division, to even up the numbers – they go in with Catania, Rayo Vallecano and Cardiff City, then balance is restored. The final group, as mentioned, is Fulham, Betis, Sassuolo and Greuter Furth, Henry Kissinger’s team.
Six games in each group, ten groups, over the course of a week, broadcast all over the world and staged in emerging markets. Financially, it makes sense. The players’ workload – an extra three games – would not be overly demanding. It could be staged every two years, to fill those long, non-tournament summers. And finally, we might have a reasonable answer to the question Keane is posing: which, when it comes down to it, is the best league?
*You could conceivably do it at the start of a non-post-tournament season, too, replacing pre-season tours, but end of the season is slightly easier, so let’s stick with that.
*Dispensation may have to be made for the cities who end up with two mid-table groups; perhaps the hosting rights could be awarded for two tournaments.
***OK, I couldn’t resist: Germany 6, Spain and England 5, Italy 4.
“Who is the best Lord? Lord of the Rings, Lord of the Flies, Lord of the Dance?” Alan Partridge, homeowner
There are certain conventions when it comes to Champions League nights on ITV. Some have fallen by the wayside, like Sir Alex Ferguson ending his post-match interviews with “well done”. Others endure, like the widespread assumption that everyone watching wants the English team to win.
This was perfectly witnessed at the end of Manchester United’s defeat to Olympiacos on Tuesday, when viewers were told that “we all hope they can turn it round in the second leg”, which must have come as a surprise to Manchester City, Liverpool and Leeds United supporters, at the very least.
Increasingly, though, the great certainty of any ITV football broadcast is that, at the end, Roy Keane will say something deeply inflammatory. In what remains a relatively young punditry career, he has already laid into Nani, Ireland’s habit of turning up at international tournaments for the craic and even, heretically, Vincent Kompany, the Manchester City captain who seems to have been nominated A Good Guy by the football fraternity, based largely on the fact that he tweets about politics sometimes.
There is a sense with Keane, now, that he is doing it on purpose, that he is playing a character just as much as Chiles (Man On Street), Lee Dixon (#tactics) and Gareth Southgate (Kind-Hearted PE Teacher In Troubled School). He has worked out he is good television, and he is playing to his audience.
Among all the fire-starting, though, Keane also found time to damn the Barclays Premier League’s claim to being the best domestic competition in the world.
Regular readers – if there is such a thing – will be aware that this is a debate which some of us find somewhat strange. Not only is there a ring of Alan Partridge to it – “What is the best league? The League of Nations, the Human League, or the Premier League?” – but it also creates an unnecessary schism, as detailed here.
That is not the only issue with the best league debate, as it is currently framed. There is also the fact that nobody quite seems to know what the criteria are. They seem, in this country at least, to shift and warp depending on what the Premier League is like at the moment.
There have been times when it is the number of teams in the title race, or success in the Champions League, or the gap between third and fourth. All of these are somewhat spurious – though not so much as the slack-jawed belief that small teams only ever beat big teams in England – and none of them provide a satisfactory answer.
Yes, more teams in England – six – start the year believing they can win the title. But more teams in Spain start the season believing they can get in the Champions League, because there are fewer teams aiming for the title. Which is better? A larger closed shop, or a smaller, but more open one?
Or is neither of these relevant? Maybe the best gauge of a league is its midpoint: how good is the team that finished tenth? Or is it only as strong as its weakest link? All are vaguely explicable; none are wholly convincing.
However. There was always going to be a however. It is quite a big however, and involves an uncomfortable amount of self-promotion, so bear with it. There is a more scientific way of establishing this fact. It is one that seems enormously fantastical, a flight of ridiculous fancy, but if you stop to think about, it could genuinely work. It is this:
At the end of next season*, 2014/15, when there is no major European or global competition, a tournament is held. Teams from the Premier League, the Bundesliga, Serie A and La Liga are invited. Each one plays in a round robin group against those sides who finished in the same position as them in the other leagues. So the champions of England, Spain, Italy and Germany play in one group, as do the runners-up, right the way down to teams who finished bottom.
For the sake of convenience – and, more importantly, money – each team only plays three games, because the groups are not conducted on a home-and-away basis. Instead, they are staged on neutral grounds, in host cities across the world. These cities, if necessary, could be paired by geographical proximity – Abu Dhabi and Dubai, Bangkok and Singapore, New York and Boston – to ensure the best facilities.
Each city or each pair would host two groups: one from the top of the tables, one from the bottom**. This should guarantee at least a sprinkling of stardust for each host; one of the very many problems with the Premier League’s 39th game was always that, no matter how good your marketing, nobody in Tokyo wants to watch Stoke against Hull City. Very few people anywhere want to watch Stoke against Hull City.
The cities would have to bid, potentially, to host games, but far more important is that by ensuring a global spread, you would access not only a vast number of match-going fans, but every major television market. The rights would be lucrative, and shared between the leagues. Not Uefa, the leagues, and straight down to the clubs.
So, let’s say we have our top group, based on current positions. Chelsea, Bayern Munich, Real Madrid and Juventus; their group would be staged in Shanghai and Hong Kong, and it would be paired with the bottom group – Fulham, Real Betis, Sassuolo and (because there are only 18 teams in the Bundesliga) Greuter Furth, currently second in Bundesliga II.
Over the course of three match-days, each team would play the others in their group once. That’s it. Three extra games, for all of that lovely television revenue, all of that merchandising, all of that brand-building. The winner of the group would claim a point for their league. It could be split in the case of a dead heat. At the end of the three match-days – over a week, maybe two – the league with the most points would win. That league would then have a fairly convincing claim to being the strongest of the four.
This is pie-in-the-sky stuff, of course, but it raises an interesting issue. It would be even more far-fetched to start suggesting who would win***, so let’s go no further than simply – on the basis of current standings – listing the groups.
We have already seen that Chelsea, Real, Juventus and Bayern make up the first. Just as appealing is Arsenal, Barcelona, Roma and Bayer Leverkusen, as well as Manchester City, Atletico Madrid, Borussia Dortmund and Napoli. The fourth group would be made up of Liverpool, Athletic Bilbao, Fiorentina and Schalke, followed by Tottenham, Villarreal, Inter Milan and Wolfsburg.
Sixth is Manchester United, Real Sociedad, Hellas Verona – Italy’s surprise package - and Borussia Mönchengladbach. Everton would face Sevilla, Parma and Hertha BSC, while Newcastle would take on Valencia, Torino and Augsburg, punching above their weight in the Bundesliga. Southampton would be in with Levante, Mainz and, more attractively, Milan.
The mid-point is West Ham, Espanyol, Lazio and Hoffenheim, who would have their games paired with a group made up of Hull, Celta Vigo, Genoa and Hannover. Swansea, Osasuna, Udinese and Nuremburg are next, before Aston Villa, Granada, Sampdoria and Eintracht Frankfurt and Norwich, Elche, Atalanta and Werder Bremen.
A group of Stoke, Getafe, Cagliari and Stuttgart may not sound like much of a proposition to a foreign audience, but the pairing system means it could effectively function as an undercard. Likewise Crystal Palace, Almeria, Chievo Verona and Hamburg, as well as West Brom, Malaga, Bologna and Freiburg and Sunderland, Valladolid, Livorno and Eintracht Braunschweig.
This brings one more complication – the Bundesliga are out of teams – but if we bring in Kaiserslautern, leaders of the German second division, to even up the numbers – they go in with Catania, Rayo Vallecano and Cardiff City, then balance is restored. The final group, as mentioned, is Fulham, Betis, Sassuolo and Greuter Furth, Henry Kissinger’s team.
Six games in each group, ten groups, over the course of a week, broadcast all over the world and staged in emerging markets. Financially, it makes sense. The players’ workload – an extra three games – would not be overly demanding. It could be staged every two years, to fill those long, non-tournament summers. And finally, we might have a reasonable answer to the question Keane is posing: which, when it comes down to it, is the best league?
*You could conceivably do it at the start of a non-post-tournament season, too, replacing pre-season tours, but end of the season is slightly easier, so let’s stick with that.
*Dispensation may have to be made for the cities who end up with two mid-table groups; perhaps the hosting rights could be awarded for two tournaments.
***OK, I couldn’t resist: Germany 6, Spain and England 5, Italy 4.