re: Could Serie A challenge EPL for 4th CL spot in 16/17?

It's always the most exciting league, nobody would argue that. And yes people who know what they are taking about would admit it's not the best league. I'm a BPL fan too. I'm just taking about the large group of fans who only watch England and yet somehow think it's the end all be all.

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No damnit, that was Arsene sad that 4th was no longer going to be good enough.

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That occurred to me too late.



On the EPL, it's strength for the foreseeable future is certainly in star power and the amount of clubs with international cache.

However, I'm not sure that the new TV money will make quite the massive difference many think unless it's invested in overhauls of youth training.

Many discuss the uneven buying power of EPL clubs as if it exists in a completely open market. However, domestic quotas, many players choosing to play in Germany, Spain or Italy for a bit less money (due to the CL or simply preferred culture in many cases) indicates a partially closed market. So, of course, no matter how much money QPR or Sunderland have they're not simply going to buy the majority of Villarreal's lineup.

It will certainly mean more mid-table EPL clubs cherry pick here and there but one clear strength of clubs in La Liga, Bundesliga, Serie A resides in the supply of similar players.
In fact, the extra money can often help those clubs more than losing one player may set them back.

Of course, my point isn't that one of the handful of giants taking an elite superstar won't always hurt but that mid table EPL sides aren't likely to lure those type guys regardless of money and the negative impact of simply losing above average players here and there for absurd transfer fees is often overstated.


If you take Fiorentina, for example, their being "raided" by EPL clubs for Nastasic left them with Savic and the money to sign Borja Valero and buy Juan Cuadrado plus a couple of more young prospects. That Chelsea will give them Salah and around €20 for Cuadrado will likely mean a similar net gain. EPL money made them stronger.


The only way the money difference in the EPL will really create a drastic separation would be that numerous mid-table English clubs use it to exponentially increase production of their own elite players.

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If you take Fiorentina, for example

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Valencia is a case that really confuses me. They weren't even in a position to reinvest, and they'll probably be back in the CL next year.

Spent less than they sold (Mathieu), though they splashed on Perez in January

Negredo was at Sevilla before Man City. Still, Dani Parejo is their leading scorer in the league right now

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I think the EPL's biggest problem is squad turnover among the teams competing in Europe. From the top 6 clubs (City, Man U, Arsenal, Liverpool, Spurs, and Chelsea), how many players in their starting lineups have been on the team 3+ seasons? Maybe 2-3 for each? If you go back to 2008, the year the EPL dominated the Champions League, it was more like 6-7 on average.

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Im certainly no expert on the EPL but I think it's a good point about turnover as it applies to ManU and Arsenal specifically and those are two clubs responsible for a lot of the EPL's most recent European success and to clubs like Liverpool or Tottenham (which has spent a ton on an almost complete overhaul but is not really better than Fiorentina or Lazio) that could have "stepped in" currently.



I'd say that Man City's problems lie elsewhere though. They've actually had their core of stars (Kompany, Aguero, Silva, Yaya, Nasri, Zabaletta, Clichy, Kolorov) for as long as most other top clubs around Europe. To me, their issue is one of simply having many stars that you can't leave out but also don't really fit together as cohesively as needed to reach the next level. I look back to Mancini's experiments with the 3-5-2, which many criticized as needless tinkering at the time, as simply his recognition of issues in playing Aguero, Silva and Toure all together if they were going to compete with the elite teams.


On a different not, but one that may be related to your point about consistency: the current group of English players in their primes don't offer some of the same elite players that were, at least, at heart of the best Liverpool, ManU and Chelsea sides recently. Maybe England never had all that many but the best were really world class. Not sure of how much it matters but the best Italian sides of the 00s and Spanish and German ones now have/had some all-time domestic greats at their core.