The highly-anticipated clash between Real Madrid and PSG,
two of the teams expected to be among the leading contenders to win this
season’s UEFA Champions League, ultimately ended up being rather one-sided,
with Real winning 3-1.
However, what I would like to highlight is this: the
result is a clear indictment of the low standards of Ligue 1.
PSG’s dominance in their domestic league looks impressive
on paper, but this domestic dominance actually hurts them greatly when they
play in the Champions League.
The fact that Ligue 1 is so weak allows PSG to get away
with bad habits, sloppy play here and there, and sub-optimal performances. In a
league where they have no true challenger, this poses no problems to them in
the domestic league.
However, week after week, game after game, these bad
habits and complacency can easily end up becoming a part of the team’s
identity. What happens when this team carries such an identity into a match
against a team like Real Madrid, who are not only loaded with superstars, but
also play in a far more treacherous, difficult league every single week?
Against Real Madrid, PSG were completely exposed. They
only took four corner kicks to Real’s 11 and launched 20% fewer attacks than
Real Madrid did, despite having the same amount of possession. The likes of
Yuri Berchiche and Giovani Lo Celso had truly dismal performances which they
could easily have gotten away with in Ligue 1, but certainly not against a team
like Real.
This has happened to PSG before.
Last year, PSG conceded three late goals to be knocked
out by Barcelona.
Once again, the quality of play they produced in the
final minutes would have been enough to hang on against an average Ligue 1
team, but against Barça, the complacency and over-confidence they showed led to
their shocking exit.
Among the teams that participated in the first set of
first-leg round of 16 matches, the other teams not from one of the major
European leagues also showed their frailties.
In the three matches involving a team not from one of the
four leading leagues against a team from such a league, the three teams from
the weaker leagues (Basel, Porto, PSG) were outscored by a combined 12 goals to
1.
When Shakhtar Donetsk play against Roma and Beşiktaş
against Bayern Munich later this week, expect the gap to grow even wider, as
both will likely lose.
Although Porto do not lead their league by quite the same
margin that PSG do, and Basel are not even top of their league, the point is
still as clear as ever: a weak domestic league does not prepare a team well for
the Champions League.
The history of the Champions League has also shown that
you almost certainly have to be from a strong domestic league to win it all,
which makes sense, as the domestic league should be where a team undergoes
trials and challenges week after week so that they will be ready to take on
Europe’s finest teams on the biggest stage of them all.
Since 1996, with the exception of Porto in 2004, every
single team to have won the Champions League has been from the Bundesliga,
Premier League, Serie A, or La Liga. It must also be kept in mind that Porto
were led by arguably the greatest head coach of all time in José Mourinho.
In fact, not since Porto and Monaco that year has a team
from outside the four major leagues even reached the final of the Champions
League.
That’s not even the most revealing statistic.
When Monaco made last season’s semifinals, it was the
first time in seven years that a team from outside the four major leagues had
even made it that far.
It will obviously take something truly remarkable for a
team outside Spain, England, Germany, or Italy to win the Champions League.
This is because as long as Ligue 1, as well as the other
leagues across Europe, do not raise their overall level of performance, their
respective clubs’ performances in the Champions League will continue to suffer
because of the lack of top-class opponents they face in their own country.
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