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[quote=JD47john;29407784]But you consider this a bad season for Barcelona and yet they are walking away with the league and made it to another CL semi-final, even after being poor throughout like you said. I am not saying they have been great or anything. All I am saying is that they are still giants and its wrong to say its the end of an era.
What if they come back and win it next year? Will the era have begun again? Will they not be the best team in the world?
People also going on about how good Bayern are. Fabulous, great, animal team but what if they bottle it and lose to Dortmund in the final? That would be 3 out of 4 CL final losses. People saying its the start of a new Bayern era, but what if they lose?
Overall, Bayern smashed Barca and deserve their place in the final. However, Barcelona are still the number 1 greatest team in Europe in my eyes. I think that if they sort out their defense(which they will), then they will be ready to dominate Europe again.[/quote]
I didn't say it was the end of an era, that was someone else. But it's the high-lighted part that shows the inappropriate blind faith of too many Barca fans. Remember that so many Champions League home-and-aways are decided by away goals! (or maybe just one goal), here you had Bayern rip them for 7!! Any team that gets beat that bad doesn't deserve to be in a semi-final. Maybe it's the American sports in me but if a team makes the Super Bowl or NBA Finals and gets destroyed, everyone thinks they need to go back to the drawing board.
And La Liga really is a soft, 2-team league that even lacks diversity. Get some money pumping back into Italy and France (PSG and now Monaco!) and I think La Liga could fall to #5.
Not a fan of Barca, but how can winning a domestic league and play CL semi-final be considered a bad year?
Even for Barca standards, this is a good season for them.
I didn't say it was the end of an era, that was someone else. But it's the high-lighted part that shows the inappropriate blind faith of too many Barca fans.
I wasn't talking about you mate. I was talking about people in general. A lot of people I know and people on Twitter and so are saying its the end of an era. I just disagree with that. I don't understand the logic to it. If you base it on one season, then does that mean that if Bayern lose in the final, their season has been a failure and they are on the downfall? That's the point I am trying to make.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Back to NE
Remember that so many Champions League home-and-aways are decided by away goals! (or maybe just one goal), here you had Bayern rip them for 7!! Any team that gets beat that bad doesn't deserve to be in a semi-final. Maybe it's the American sports in me but if a team makes the Super Bowl or NBA Finals and gets destroyed, everyone thinks they need to go back to the drawing board.
That's been Barcelona's problem. At the back they are awful. That will be changed and sorted out though in the summer. A lot of people coming out and saying that Hummels is a done deal(and what a deal that would be). They will sort it out at the back.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Back to NE
And La Liga really is a soft, 2-team league that even lacks diversity. Get some money pumping back into Italy and France (PSG and now Monaco!) and I think La Liga could fall to #5.
I have to disagree with you there mate. La Liga is a two horse race but so is a lot of other leagues in Europe. Germany is the same. Outside the top 3, German football is the same. Bayern are a superpower in that league. You know you have a problem when the top team in the league can take the best player from the second best team in the league without a bother.
The German league is a great league for many reasons but at the end of the day, its just the same as La Liga when it comes to winning it. 1,2 maybe 3 teams can only win it and to be honest, it looks like Bayern are going to be the team that walks away with it for years now that the will have Pep, Goetze, maybe Lewandowski and more cash to spend than the Irish economy.
Sine we're talking about the balance and depth of various league's, here are a list of the top 3 finishers since 2000:
Bundesliga:
Bayern Munich, Werder Bremen, Borussia Dortmund, Wolfsburg, Stuggart have all won titles. Schalke 04, Bayer Leverkussen and Hamburger SV have all had top 3 finishes. With the exception of Hamburger SV, all of these teams have multiple top 3 finishes since 2000.
Premiere League:
Chelsea, Arsenal, Manchester City and Manchester United have all won titles. Liverpool and Newcastle United have also had top 3 finishes. Newcastle has only 1 top 3 finish and Liverpool has had more than 1.
Serie A:
Juventus, AC Milan, Inter Milan and Roma have won titles. Lazio, Napoli and Udinese have had top 3 finishes. Lazio has had multiple top 3 finishes. All of the winners have multiple top 3 finishes.
La Liga:
Real Madrid, Valencia and Barcelona have won titles. Each club have won multiple titles. Real Sociedad, Villareal, Sevilla and Deportivo La Caruna have all had top 3 finishes. All of these clubs have had multiple top 3 finishes.
Ligue 1:
Nantes, Lyon, Bordeaux, Lille, Marseille and Montpellier have all won titles. Lens, Lens, Monaco, PSG, Toulouse and Auxerre have all had top 3 finishes. Aside from Lens and Auxerre, all of the other clubs have multiple top 3 finishes.
Primeira Liga:
Boavista, Porto, Sporting CP and Benfica have all won titles. Braga and Vitoria de Guimaraes have had top 3 finishes. All clubs except Vitoria de Guimaraes have had multiple top 3 finishes.
Barca arent gone by any means, it wont take more than a few players to spruce the squad up to dominate like they have been doing. You dont just go bad like that and its not like they dont have the financial backing to buy their way out of the situation.
Their core is old and they will have problems replacing Puyol, Xavi and Iniesta because of their reputations with the club.
UEFA can keep crowning those guys as the best X1 in Europe while they keep declining.
Also, you are ignoring the Spanish economy in this issue. They are unable to purchase players without selling off assets. No longer can Barcelona & Madrid go on shopping sprees centered on ridiculous loans from Spanish banks. Yes they should be okay this offseason after shifting pieces by selling off guys like Villa/Fabregas but they are in no position to stockpile talent like Bayern currently is.
Bayern will go on a legit 3+ year run and eclipse the 09-12 Barcelona team.
Exactly if Bayern lose their 3rd final in 4 years and Barca strengthen, which they will, in the summer - then the tides could turn back in Barcas direction. They still have the best player on earth and a sh:t load of money to spend. Barca are entitled to have one poor season (if you can call it poor) after the dominance of the past few years.
"When Real Madrid bought Cristiano Ronaldo and Kaka the club took out a staggering loan of 136 million Euros to buy just two players. The banks didn’t hesitate and even gave the club a low, low rate of 1.5%, a normal business would normally have to pay double that."
"new club president Sandro Rosell revealed they had been forced into the move for cash flow reasons, as they were struggling to pay important commitments such as the salaries of players, coaching staff and employees."
"A report from ESADE that looks into transfer activity in Europe’s top soccer leagues has revealed that La Liga has seen total transfer investment drop by a whopping 62 percent during the 2012-2013 season. Of the top five leagues, Spain saw the lowest investment, spending just $187 million in the summer and winter transfer markets this year. By comparison, the English Premier League spent $1.02 billion, Serie A spent $570 million, the Bundesliga $362 million and Ligue 1 $330 million."
Like I said, Barcelona still has assets like Villa/Fabregas to sell off so they can remain a contender. But expect more exodus from La Liga and that includes these two teams. The dominance is over.
You could make the claim that as Euro Union bails out Spanish Banks, Germany (among others) funded Barcelona and Real. IMO, it was poetic justice to see them get man handled.
I didn't say it was the end of an era, that was someone else. But it's the high-lighted part that shows the inappropriate blind faith of too many Barca fans.
Yeah, I said that, and frankly, I do think it is the end of an era we're witnessing. Of course, Barça will still be a great team, one of the best in Europe. But they will no longer be this nearly invincible force, this super-team dominating Europe the way they did the last five, six years. They will be one of the best teams - but together with a couple of other teams. No longer the out-of-this-world team they were for a couple of years.
And also what Thetroof said: Spanish banks are not giving away free lunches anymore the way they used to do it. I'm a huge La Liga fan, always will be, but economically they're in dire straits. No arguing there.
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