0:02

The Athletic Thank

0:11

you for joining us this week on

0:13

The Athletic Football Tactics podcast. I'm Ali

0:15

Maxwell with us today in the

0:17

studio. You'll never guess who's here. Marcelo

0:20

Bielsa. No, I'm just kidding. Michael

0:23

Cox, Mark Carey and

0:26

Liam Tharm. Hi guys. Hello Ali.

0:29

Imagine. Liam, you've been

0:31

away since we last spoke in

0:33

Switzerland of all places. Yes. I went out

0:35

to neon to watch the Youth

0:37

League final there, which was a really

0:39

good time. Olympiacos beat Milan 3-0. First

0:42

ever Greek, so the under-19s were

0:44

coming up at the Champions League. Team to

0:46

get that deep in the competition. Milan first

0:48

Italian finalists. And yeah, really good

0:50

final. The most neutral of

0:52

all venues for that. And you

0:54

wrote a really interesting piece off

0:56

the back of it about the

0:58

UEFA Youth League. I would recommend

1:00

that that is bookmarked for after

1:02

this podcast has been consumed. But

1:04

it was another UEFA competition in

1:06

which English clubs have failed miserably

1:09

this season. Of course, last week a

1:11

number of English clubs crashing out of

1:14

the senior UEFA competitions, Champions League, Europa

1:16

League and England now officially behind

1:18

Italy and Germany in the coefficient. There's

1:20

been a lot about that on site

1:22

as well. Last week we spoke about

1:24

Bialevikusen winning the title in Germany and

1:26

breaking the Bayern Munich monopoly. And all

1:28

of this stuff has got

1:30

us thinking about how you

1:33

compare the strength of

1:35

European leagues, but also the

1:37

competitiveness within the mark.

1:39

This has in particular been a big part

1:42

of your life over the last week or

1:44

two. You've written a piece trying to answer

1:46

questions like that from a data perspective. Was

1:48

that a difficult piece to write? It

1:51

was to look at it from a statistical perspective

1:53

because I think it's clear and I know that

1:55

Michael's written on it extensively in the past about

1:57

the we can see by eye in

1:59

certain leagues. that there's a huge disparity

2:01

Germany previously being one of them of

2:03

course not this season but it

2:05

was yeah it was an interesting one to do it was a bit of a labor

2:07

of love and because there's been a lot of

2:10

talk about this UAFE for coefficient which is kind of something

2:13

of a vague term I think that people don't quite

2:15

know exactly what goes into it so I thought let's

2:17

try and actually address it and then strip it back

2:19

and see which which league is the most

2:22

competitive Michael people

2:24

love conversations about the strength of even

2:26

an individual league from year to year

2:28

this is a really strong Premier League

2:30

or this feels like a very weak

2:32

Premier League but also trying to compare

2:35

the strength of leagues across the

2:37

continent it's you know

2:39

there's so many different variables and and

2:41

almost we lack an

2:43

actual definition of how to

2:46

measure the strength of a league

2:48

when it comes to competitiveness you've

2:50

written at length about the competitiveness

2:53

or lack thereof in top European

2:55

divisions over the last few years

2:57

you generally focus those on the

2:59

title winners and how dominant they

3:01

are yeah I

3:03

think that's the main thing you care about

3:05

as an outsider or someone looking to follow

3:07

lots of leagues I mean I'd like

3:09

to think that I have you know a fair

3:12

idea of what's going on across the major European

3:14

leagues but the relegation battles I don't really know

3:16

about and I don't think too

3:18

much about the difference between or the gap

3:20

between top and bottom even though in some

3:23

ways that is probably the best indicator yes

3:25

so that was a big part of Mark's

3:27

piece was not just focusing on the title

3:29

winners and you know how often

3:31

a title is won by a different club but

3:34

also looking at measures of team quality

3:36

on the one hand and then after

3:38

that Mark trying to understand competitiveness

3:41

as the gap in quality

3:44

and also in in budgets

3:46

and squad value between

3:48

let's say the top teams the bottom teams

3:50

and of course those in between exactly

3:53

yeah and I did some graphics to kind of

3:55

outline that and show that and people are very

3:57

welcome to look at the piece to see that

3:59

so Essentially what I did was work with

4:02

a company called 21st Group who are a sports

4:04

intelligent firm. I know that you know

4:06

them well as well, Ali. They provided essentially

4:09

data of each club's squad value, as

4:11

you mentioned. It was using a model

4:13

that ignores market factors as well, which

4:15

I think is quite important considering you're

4:18

talking about the Premier League, the inflation

4:20

of budgets and prices in general. It

4:22

was stripping all that back and just looking at each

4:24

player's contribution to their

4:27

team's chances of scoring goals and performing

4:29

well and then aggregating that per team

4:31

or per squad to get a nice

4:33

clear value. What

4:35

I did was use an analysis to

4:37

essentially measure that distribution of the values

4:40

of the squads within each league, what's

4:42

called a Gini coefficient for each league.

4:45

Essentially what this is, is an economics measure basically

4:47

used to evaluate... There's nothing to do with Gini,

4:50

Wijnaldum. No, I've done this in a previous piece

4:52

and I had to address it to say, no,

4:54

not Wijnaldum, but let's sort of come along with

4:56

me on this journey. It's used

4:58

to evaluate the wealth distribution across a

5:01

country's population is the long and short

5:03

of it. Rather than use it

5:05

in a population level, the analysis basically assessed the

5:08

distribution and equality within the league. So

5:10

we're calling each league a little mini

5:12

population, shall we say. Great part of

5:14

your job is being

5:16

smart enough to understand all

5:18

these incredibly complicated algorithms,

5:20

models, et cetera, and then

5:22

just going, what if I

5:24

apply that to football? Because football is more fun. Exactly

5:27

that. Yeah, that is the fun part. And I don't

5:29

know how much it has been done

5:31

in the past, there's been a bit of work on

5:33

it. But yeah, that's basically what I

5:35

do. I basically steal from other places, other

5:38

platforms, other disciplines and apply

5:40

it to football. And essentially I

5:42

won't go through each individual number, but the

5:44

lower the number of this coefficient, the more

5:46

equal the league is. And then I sort

5:48

of outline that and we can talk about

5:51

some of the output. The piece is fascinating

5:53

for anyone interested in data analysis and football.

5:55

And the topic that we're talking about today,

5:58

it's going to give us the platform really to do. try

6:00

and go across Europe and European

6:02

leagues and really I'm just going

6:04

to try and tease out some

6:06

thoughts and analysis on a

6:08

carousal of European leagues and see what

6:10

we can dredge up. We are not

6:12

going to talk much about the Premier

6:15

League, we talk about it a lot,

6:17

there is a lot of known knowns

6:19

when it comes to the Premier League.

6:21

It's unsurprising for example that your analysis

6:23

showed that the Premier League tops the

6:25

lot for average team rating, so measuring

6:27

the quality of the teams, but maybe

6:29

less obviously for some. It had a very

6:31

strong competitiveness score in terms of the equality

6:34

of squad values. Now we are in a

6:36

situation where Manchester City have won five of

6:38

the last six league titles, they are heavily

6:40

favoured to win the league again this year.

6:42

So on the one hand in terms of

6:44

pure title winners it doesn't feel great right

6:46

now in terms of that as a measure

6:49

of competitiveness. What

6:51

about this idea that in terms of the

6:53

equality of squad values the Premier League actually

6:55

does come out very well alongside Ligue 1?

6:58

Yeah and I think that it is worth saying that the

7:00

Premier League is just an entity of its own

7:02

in terms of the financial clout that they have

7:04

with the television revenues and then broadly just the

7:07

amount of money that's within that league. So I think

7:09

there is that as well where even

7:12

the likes of Ligue 1 are getting

7:14

in and around £100 million on some

7:16

TV revenues, that's still a

7:18

lot of money compared to your

7:20

average Ligue 1 team for example. So there is that

7:22

to account for it as well and I would be

7:24

interested to get the guys thoughts on it in terms

7:26

of the wider distribution of

7:28

let's say 6th to 16th within the Premier

7:30

League because I think there is a real

7:32

small gap there overall. But I

7:35

think the thing about the Premier League in particular is that it is,

7:37

I was looking at strength and competitiveness

7:39

and the good thing about the Premier League is that

7:41

it is obviously a really strong league, stronger than any

7:43

other in the world but it also

7:45

has a really strong competitiveness and we can

7:47

look at Ligue 1 for example, I think

7:49

it is fair to say that its strength

7:51

is maybe a little bit lower but its

7:53

competitiveness is really strong, the strongest of the

7:56

top five European leagues, top seven European leagues.

7:58

I know Liam watches. the French

8:00

League quite a lot and I think it matches

8:03

and passes the eye test in terms

8:05

of beyond PSG which are the obvious

8:07

outlier. Just how much from maybe

8:09

second or third right way down to mid

8:11

table I'd say the pack could shuffle any

8:13

which way to fall into a certain position

8:16

which I think is hugely interesting makes a

8:18

greater entertainment value irrespective of

8:20

the strength of the League. It's the self-branded

8:22

League of Talents for a reason which I've

8:24

said on this podcast before and part

8:27

of the benefit of that of having such a

8:29

pathway from really good academies across the board and

8:31

bringing three young players and when

8:33

they come together in sort of a generation teams can

8:35

do really really well. We've seen that with Monaco that

8:37

then sort of got picked apart, Lyon who also had

8:40

quite a shaky start to the season and have recovered

8:42

really really well and even when you

8:44

sort of exclude sort of PSG from being such a

8:46

dominant team the real mix of teams that end

8:49

up in and around the European place is

8:51

all close to qualifying. There's been ten different

8:53

top six finishes in the past four seasons.

8:55

Oh sorry that would be the case assuming

8:57

Bresse finished that high this season. So bar

8:59

PSG you've had Lons, Marseille, Lyon, Lille, Monaco,

9:01

Nis, Strasbourg and Lyon all in the past

9:03

three seasons have been up there. You've had

9:06

the likes of Santatien and Nimes fourth and

9:08

ninth in 2018-19. They're now in

9:10

Ligue 2 so they're not even in the top

9:12

division anymore. So it's volatile in

9:14

a good and bad way in that you then get

9:16

quite a mix of different teams that can compete and

9:19

at the same time that can quite quickly sort

9:21

of fall apart and teams struggle to sustain their

9:23

success which means that PSG often aren't really challenged

9:25

because teams can't really stay up there for long

9:27

enough to get the European revenue and to develop

9:29

that score over time it tends to get picked

9:31

apart. Ligue

9:33

1 did move from 20 teams down

9:35

to 18 not long ago. Michael

9:38

what drives a decision like that and

9:40

what's the impact that it has? Well

9:42

it should make things more competitive because

9:45

the smaller the league you have obviously

9:47

the smaller the gap between top and

9:49

bottom. You know if you go

9:51

back 20 years there was a bit of consensus in European

9:53

football that leagues were too big and then Step Blatter was

9:56

for a long time trying to get all the European leagues

9:58

to move to 16 teams. he

10:00

was had a fever, he was self-interested, he

10:02

wanted more focus on international

10:04

tournaments and maybe international club

10:06

tournaments. That was kind of rejected then

10:09

it moved towards oh they should be 18 and at

10:12

roughly that point Serie A actually moved from 18 to 20

10:14

so it did the opposite. But I

10:16

mean personally speaking I just think leagues are

10:18

too big. I think they're too big when

10:20

you consider A the fact that the gap

10:22

between top and bottom is pretty big and

10:25

B when you consider it's often the same

10:28

team as winning every year and

10:30

the argument for league seasons used to be while the cream will

10:32

rise to the top the best team will win it. But

10:34

I actually think things are so predictable now you don't

10:36

necessarily want the best team winning it you want a

10:39

bit more unpredictability. That's more likely to come from like

10:41

a 30 game season than a 42

10:43

game season or whatever. So for

10:45

me that you know making leagues smaller

10:47

makes a lot of sense. It's

10:50

quite closely tied as well to France,

10:52

Switzerland, their sort of historic failures in European

10:54

competitions. Obviously the conference league being added in

10:57

now means there's extra games for certain teams.

10:59

Champions League is going to expand so it's

11:01

kind of a in advance

11:03

response to what's going to happen there. They've

11:05

also been postponing games for the European team

11:07

so PSG, Lille, Marseille

11:10

had games all perspiring between the first and second

11:12

leg I think it was of the quarterfinals and

11:14

they're going to do the same again ahead of

11:16

the semi-finals so they're trying to sort of maximize

11:18

their success there. I wonder if that's in part

11:20

sort of knowing that if Kylian Mbappe is departing

11:22

the league they've lost probably the face of the

11:24

league for the most part they're trying to sort

11:26

of accommodate for that and there's only

11:28

one domestic cup now as well so they don't

11:30

you know I know it's quite common sort of

11:32

across the other European leagues. I think England probably

11:34

now is more of an outline in terms of

11:36

having two but yeah it's just trying to sort

11:38

of really channel that focus into having a as

11:40

Michael says a competitive league and then being able

11:42

to compete more on the European front as well.

11:45

I think it's worth noting as well so it's only

11:47

at the start of this league that they've moved down

11:49

to 18 teams but one of the large reasons is

11:51

because they're trying to professionalize the

11:53

top three divisions within France. I think

11:56

the third division at the

11:58

moment is semi-professional so it's the the

12:00

French company body looking to basically

12:02

try and drive the competitiveness down the league.

12:04

Obviously we have a really strong English football

12:06

pyramid and they're looking to do I guess

12:08

something kind of similar. But then also having

12:10

fewer teams within Ligue 1 is going to

12:13

naturally then have more competitiveness

12:15

as a consequence. Overall

12:17

Michael, given PSG's dominance, they're about to

12:19

make it 10 titles in 12 years.

12:21

Does that for

12:23

you just mean there is such

12:25

a lack of competitiveness as to

12:27

make the league therefore basically

12:30

uninteresting to you? Yeah, I

12:32

think it's a waste of time. I mean I know they

12:34

have failed a couple of times in recent years. Monaco won

12:36

it that year and had a great team and Ligue 1

12:39

a couple of years ago. But in general I don't think

12:41

it's interesting to the outsider. That's Percy

12:43

speaking. To be honest, when PSG

12:46

signed Lionel Messi, people

12:48

were saying, wow, Messi and Neymar and Mbappe playing

12:51

together, that's going to be tremendous to watch. I

12:53

mean I don't find it interesting them putting six or seven

12:55

goals past much weaker teams. I'd

12:57

rather those three players were at different clubs and

13:00

you get a bit more of a competitive

13:02

setting. I think France is quite interesting. I mean

13:05

I'm reading a very good book at the moment

13:07

about French football with Vava Voum by Tom Williams.

13:09

He made some interesting points about the nature of

13:11

French football in that the rate

13:13

of urbanisation in France is not very high. So

13:16

you don't have that many cities. So there aren't

13:18

that many big groups of population

13:20

that can sustain big clubs to compete with

13:22

someone like PSG. And the other interesting thing

13:24

about France is they don't

13:26

have any cities, I don't think, where there's more

13:29

than one club. We're used to

13:31

Liverpool and Manchester and of course London sustaining

13:33

two clubs. In terms

13:36

of pure population, PSG

13:38

should be being challenged by maybe another Parisian

13:40

club. But you have all the support pretty

13:42

much going into PSG. That's obviously without considering

13:44

the fact that they're a pretty new club.

13:46

The wealth has come from outside

13:49

France. But it's quite tough I

13:51

think in France for clubs to become

13:53

certainly European superpowers

13:57

and that's what they need to be really.

14:00

to challenge PSG, who are themselves now

14:02

slightly out of nowhere over the last

14:05

10 years, obviously a European superpower. And

14:07

I don't think it actually helps PSG

14:09

in the European sense that they don't

14:11

get many relevant tests in Ligue 1.

14:13

A lot of the time, OK

14:15

teams are generally starting to press high now

14:18

more across the board, but often teams will

14:20

sit back, you'll see more back fives, more

14:22

defensive approaches, and in terms of

14:24

the quality even tactically, it's not always a

14:27

relevant test for them, compared to then trying

14:29

to prepare themselves for going into Europe. So it's

14:31

almost like playing one way in the league and then

14:34

a different way in Europe. And the only

14:36

thing that's ironic when you don't look at France

14:38

is how well they've done internationally in this time,

14:40

as a C&M international side. You

14:42

know, multiple World Cup finals, World Cup winners,

14:45

Euros finalists, admittedly losing on home

14:48

soil, but have been consistently probably

14:50

one of, if not the best teams in the

14:53

world over a really long period of time, because

14:55

the way their league works, the teams don't tend

14:57

to succeed very well, but individuals keep coming through

14:59

and keep coming through. So that's kind of the

15:01

culture that's been developed there. And it's a

15:04

bit of a shame that it's so predictable, because if you go

15:06

back 15 years, Ligue 1 was, I mean, it

15:08

was never close to the best league, but it was the

15:10

most competitive league. You had a period of six seasons where

15:12

you had six different winners, Lyon,

15:14

Bordeaux, Marseille, Lyon, Montpellier and PSG. Now

15:16

the start of that was the end

15:19

of Lyon's 7 in a row, and

15:21

the end of that was the start

15:23

of PSG's dominance. But it was really

15:26

entertaining in that bit in between. You

15:28

had Giroud's Montpellier came from nowhere, Hazard's,

15:30

Lille, Gaucouff's, Bordeaux. I mean, really good

15:32

teams. Quite exciting. I think

15:35

the problem is, obviously, it's a

15:37

bit of a selling league, and often teams lose

15:39

the best clothes. There's nothing wrong with a bit

15:41

of disagreement within the room on this pod. We

15:43

don't have it that often, but, Liam, you like

15:46

Ligue 1, you think there's more to it than

15:49

just a procession for PSG. Teams

15:51

like Brest, you mentioned a third at

15:53

the moment, L'Anse reaching the Champions League

15:56

last season. For you, that is

15:58

interesting and to an extent, it's a bit of a selling competitive?

16:00

Yeah, well I mean I agree with Michael's point in

16:02

that it's not competitive if you look at it through

16:04

the lens of the winner, but I guess the reason

16:06

I'd probably connect with that league is just through watching

16:08

a lot of youth football and sort of having my

16:10

roots there is I enjoy seeing young players sort of

16:12

coming through and sort of cutting their teeth so to

16:14

speak and you now see a lot of, especially in

16:17

the Premier League, I think it's one of the biggest

16:19

leagues exporting into the Premier League, if not the biggest

16:21

from Ligand, you know, people that now look at, take

16:24

William Saliba as a prime example of people that watched

16:26

Ligand however many years ago when he was there were

16:28

saying, look, we saw some of these traits down this

16:30

player coming through so it's not trying to

16:32

be that sort of tactical hips to saying, oh

16:34

I knew this person sort of four or five years ago, but it's

16:36

nice to be able to see someone come through

16:39

before they kind of become the finished article, which is

16:41

just sort of the way that I like to consume

16:43

football, but I understand that titles and shiny things are

16:45

also really good fun. So in that regard you do

16:48

sort of accept that it's kind of

16:50

a fatal flaw with that league at the moment in the, you

16:52

know, PSG's budget I think when I was looking on FB ref

16:54

which the accuracy of those finances

16:56

might not be 100% guaranteed, but it's

16:58

like four times that of the next biggest team,

17:00

which is Marseille and they're kind of renowned for

17:02

being a bit of a bar sit case really.

17:05

Yeah, I mean, just on that note, so working with

17:07

21st Group on this, they produce the squad values and

17:10

PSG squad value per their numbers is

17:13

816 million pounds. The

17:16

next size is Ren on 329 million pounds. It's

17:19

also interesting, I know that the whole point of my

17:21

analysis wasn't to just look at the top and the

17:24

bottom, but for context, Claremont Foote's squad value is the

17:26

lowest 54 million pounds. So you've got

17:28

54 million pounds with 816. That's

17:30

a big disparity from top to bottom. Again, not

17:33

the point of the wider competitiveness within this of

17:35

the middle bracket, but huge from top to bottom.

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18:30

into Italy and Serie A we spoke about its recently crowned

18:32

champions Inter Milan on

18:44

the podcast just a few weeks ago. Michael,

18:47

in Serie A do we have currently the

18:49

most competitive league when it comes to the

18:51

title race? Maybe, I mean there's been, in

18:54

Italy we've had four different

18:56

winners in five seasons, Juventus,

18:58

Inter twice, Milan and Napoli.

19:01

That obviously follows a spell of Juventus

19:03

winning it nine times in a row

19:05

and it feels like across Europe in

19:07

general. I mean that was Juventus PSG

19:09

by and almost every year so it

19:11

was quite boring. The funny thing

19:14

is that you've had Napoli and Inter

19:16

win the last two titles and

19:18

that is exciting because it was Milan the year before that so you've

19:20

had three in three. But

19:22

they've also won it by quite a long

19:24

way. I mean Napoli were miles clear by

19:26

the turn of the year. Inter haven't really

19:29

had a challenge this year. So it depends

19:31

what you want. I mean do you just

19:33

want different names winning it or would you

19:35

be happier if it was Napoli every year

19:37

and they won it by two points from

19:39

a different team every year? It's

19:41

two different sides of the debate really. I

19:43

suppose you want a bit of both ideally.

19:46

But is that not another

19:48

layer of competitiveness

19:50

that clearly even

19:53

the second, third, fourth best teams

19:55

in the league find it hard

19:57

to accrue points at a very

19:59

high level? level maybe because the

20:01

middle chunk or even the worst teams

20:03

in the league are providing more competitiveness

20:05

than in other divisions. Yeah that is

20:07

maybe true I mean I think there's

20:09

always circumstantial situations I mean Napoli won

20:11

the league by miles and then basically

20:13

got rid of their manager which obviously

20:15

didn't help but yeah maybe there is

20:17

something in that maybe maybe Serie A

20:19

teams are you know very good

20:22

at making it difficult for fourth place teams

20:24

but it I mean it feels strange to

20:26

me that it's been quite so inconsistent I

20:28

don't really understand I mean even

20:30

if you include the runners up I mean Lazio finished

20:33

runners up last year they haven't been included in the list of

20:35

teams I've said because they haven't won the league since 2000 so

20:38

you do have a lot of different names popping

20:40

up Atalanta have come third three times

20:42

in the last six years Roma

20:44

always there or there about I mean

20:47

it is it is quite exciting in terms of different

20:49

names yeah. And there's another

20:51

way to look at this we've spoken purely on

20:53

the team front and managerially so there's been a

20:55

different head coach that's won the league in each

20:58

of the past six seasons which is the first

21:00

time since the late 60s early 70s so that

21:03

again speaks to the talent and sort

21:05

of the depth there and with four of those

21:07

who are with Sarri, Piolis, Spelletti and Nzagi that's

21:09

their first ever Scudetto their first ever Serie A

21:11

win and you've had that come at the same

21:13

period of time where last season Italy had a

21:16

team in each of the major UEFA finals again

21:18

that can be another way of looking at it

21:21

and again that might be specifically sort of tactical the

21:23

way those teams are the way the league is that

21:25

develops teams that can play good knockout football in that

21:27

style but again it's sort of yeah

21:29

I think it's always an interesting reflection on how well

21:32

balanced the league is within itself but then also when they

21:34

go outside that league and they play other teams in Europe.

21:36

My next question was going to be why

21:39

are clubs that win Serie

21:41

A struggling to sustain that success

21:43

into a second season whether it

21:45

was Milan, Then

21:47

Napoli Of course you know we're now talking

21:49

about Inter and Simone and Zaghi in incredibly

21:52

glowing terms and correctly so. but I Feel

21:54

a bit burnt because we did a podcast

21:56

on Napoli last year and I haven't heard

21:58

much about them. This season we did a

22:00

podcast gusto on me than the year before

22:02

and their savvy recruitment and and really sort

22:05

of turning the club around. and then again,

22:07

things go a little bit quiet for the

22:09

neutral for the outside of because they struggled

22:11

to sustain it feels like was struggling to

22:13

understand why exactly that is. What?

22:15

Of a limb hinted at it but

22:18

it's not just that has been different

22:20

managers winning is that three times the

22:22

managers one and then last said sorry

22:24

event is content into and split it

22:26

Napoli in a usually overseas could political

22:28

reasons rather than them as you just

22:30

jump into another job the basis for

22:32

now in the terminal left so that's

22:34

quite an. An. Odd thing and I

22:36

think part of the is due to financial concerns.

22:39

I think these Monday's window ledge and a lot

22:41

or I want a one a bigger budget. one

22:43

of it's compete in Europe and that's often not

22:45

really the case. I. Mean, yeah, no financial

22:47

expert, but my understanding is this area

22:49

isn't quite a bad position financially at

22:52

the moment. I was reading analysis said

22:54

recently on Apart from Cool Football Benchmark

22:56

and they said at the end of

22:58

last season sorry I had net debts

23:01

of three point two billion Euros across

23:03

the league and it's been covered extensively.

23:05

From James Horncastle about how Inter Milan,

23:07

the current champions are in hundreds of.

23:10

Millions. Of pounds during to be repaid by

23:12

the end of next month. So you're looking at

23:14

what can be one of the best Cydia seasons

23:16

ever by a team that of seat on that's

23:19

what off the back of being worthy read dominant

23:21

in cops the even that massively start getting enough

23:23

you know how to take serious risk to gets

23:25

the situation. It was also

23:27

notable mock it in the

23:29

analysis of of team strength

23:31

and how it varies within

23:33

each league that the worst

23:36

teams per twenty first groups

23:38

model in Syria are quite

23:40

significantly worse. Per. Their rating system

23:42

than the worst teams in the premier league

23:44

and the worst teams in La Liga said

23:46

seems to have i guess what what looks

23:48

like in in the data visualizations quite a

23:50

long tail at within it. Yeah exactly Yeah

23:52

this is a box and whisk the plot

23:55

for those interested in wants her to check

23:57

it out but I'm yeah no you're right,

23:59

that is party. And again, we're speaking

24:01

about competitiveness as the holy, but that

24:03

disparity from top to bottom is quite

24:05

notable. And of those 20, looking

24:08

at that difference, that range from the

24:10

highest to the lowest, Serie

24:12

A was the second highest on the list

24:14

in terms of that quality gap of team

24:16

strength. The highest was actually the area

24:18

to visit, which I'm sure we'll come on to with that gap

24:20

between you. You popular teams

24:22

that everyone knows about, PSV, Eindhoven,

24:24

Ajax, and Firenord, compared

24:27

with those right at the lower

24:29

end. But Serie A was the second highest on

24:31

that. So it just goes to show that difference.

24:33

And as Liam mentioned, if we're talking about the

24:36

title winners being in a compromise

24:38

situation financially, then you try to think

24:40

what those lower down the

24:42

top of the Italy's football

24:45

division is dealing with. Michael, in

24:47

researching this episode, I went back and read some

24:49

of your articles on the Super League fiasco. And

24:51

it was about the lack of

24:54

competitiveness across

24:56

European football. And one phrase that

24:58

I've pulled out was, you mentioned

25:00

that in some cases, there is

25:02

structural inequality that manifests itself on

25:05

the pitch. And I wonder if we talk about La Liga, with

25:07

the real domination of Real Madrid and Barcelona,

25:10

even if you stretch back 20 years, only

25:12

two titles haven't gone to one of those two

25:14

teams. They've had

25:17

an interesting and quite unique TV

25:20

deal, which seems to have had the effect of

25:22

pulling the draw bridge up a little bit on

25:24

those not named Real Madrid and Barcelona. Yeah, you're

25:26

right. The current TV deal isn't as bad as

25:28

it once was in terms of just directing all

25:30

the money to the big two, but it is

25:33

still very different from the Premier League. If

25:35

you take Itleti to go out of the equation,

25:37

they're basically getting double any other side. So double

25:39

what Sevilla or Real Betis or Valencia gets from

25:41

TV revenue, which is an issue.

25:44

It was a greater issue about 10 years ago when

25:46

they had an even bigger chunk. La

25:48

Liga has become incredibly predictable. I think it's probably

25:51

a big three rather than a big two now.

25:53

I think Itleti had done very well. Put

25:56

themselves in the frame, but you go back to the turn

25:58

of the century and you had Valenci and Deportivo. winning

26:00

La Liga titles, it's just difficult to imagine

26:02

anyone else competing now and that is despite

26:05

the fact that Sevilla are so

26:07

good at winning the Europa League, but they've never

26:09

really challenged in terms of the

26:11

La Liga title certainly not in the modern

26:13

era. So yes, Spain is is

26:16

very predictable and it's

26:18

probably no coincidence that Barcelona and Real Madrid are

26:20

two of the clubs who are driving the Super

26:22

League thing because compared to the Premier League, it's

26:24

just it's just not exciting

26:26

and despite the fact they have massive viewership in

26:28

the US and South America

26:31

I don't think it's particularly compelling week in week

26:33

out compared to for example the Premier League. Away

26:35

from home for Real Madrid and Barcelona I think

26:38

it's a bit different, but the home games are

26:40

almost a procession and they have been for 15

26:42

years now I will say that I do think

26:44

it can make the Darby's between, or the Classico

26:46

in this case, really quite a competitive game that's

26:48

something that I didn't think there's ever been a

26:51

point in the past decade, decade and

26:53

a half where anyone said this really isn't worth watching.

26:55

It's the kind of game that everyone and I'm not

26:57

a frequent La Liga watcher, but we'll always sort

26:59

of try and tune in for that and you can compare that

27:01

now to between

27:03

Inter Milan and Inter 1's six Darby's

27:06

in a row which is the most

27:08

by either side, either set of constants

27:10

if you will, in an entire history.

27:13

Obviously there's climax with them

27:15

actually lifting the title, winning the Scudetto

27:17

in that game so I think that's

27:19

another wrinkle to look at because and

27:22

this is where probably again France comes into it of having

27:25

a lot more regional Darby's because they just don't have

27:27

as much with sister teams in the cities that I

27:29

think that's a point in terms of if people aren't

27:32

going to want to engage with a league that that

27:34

can often be the buy-in for people is that sort

27:36

of your biggest game that's your poster game. It's why

27:38

I think partly English will sell so

27:40

well because you've got in different parts of the

27:42

country across London there's a ridiculous number of London

27:44

Darby's a season. I realize I'm flying the flag

27:46

for the the wider discussion on the competitiveness rather

27:48

than just kind of at that top end but

27:50

I do think there's something to be

27:52

said about the the wider strength of the

27:55

likes of Girona that we've spoken about them

27:57

a lot of times on this podcast. Athletic

27:59

Club has done well this season. Real

28:01

saucy done obviously in the Champions League this

28:03

season having done so well last season they're

28:05

doing pretty well this season as well. I

28:07

think there's again the wider point to be

28:09

made about the competitiveness and again

28:12

speaking about the the squad value again Barcelona

28:14

and Real Madrid are on a high high

28:16

level well beyond their their

28:18

nearest competitors but looking kind of more

28:20

broadly so Ria Vallecano and Cadiz are

28:22

the only two sides this season whose

28:24

squad value is less than 100 million

28:26

pounds which I think is is a

28:29

really important point to say that every other side

28:31

as you can imagine are above that which which

28:34

brings that cluster in the middle to to

28:36

show that competitiveness so there's not that gap

28:38

that I mentioned before of Clermont Foote and

28:40

PSG there's a lot of teams around that

28:43

that middle area who are really competing for

28:45

for those middle spots. And in the Bundesliga

28:47

we were very excited last week to talk

28:49

about Bayern Leverkus and such a wonderful

28:52

football team and even since we've spoken

28:54

about them that the lengths that they

28:56

have gone to stay unbeaten have been

28:59

quite remarkable. They've broken the Bayern Munich

29:01

monopoly. I do think it's worth mentioning

29:03

Stuttgart as well who you know

29:05

have probably flown under the radar due

29:07

to Bayern Leverkus and success but they

29:09

are third having picked up 2.1 points

29:11

per game this season it's a club

29:14

who suffered two relegations in the last

29:16

eight seasons so remarkable success

29:18

this season Dortmund last year, Mark,

29:20

were close to winning the league

29:22

title off Bayern. Are we

29:24

about to have a more open Bundesliga era?

29:26

It's hard to say not least because Bayern

29:28

Munich are just so big

29:31

they are a powerhouse of the club and I

29:33

know from speaking to

29:35

Seb Stafarbla about just how

29:37

much the coverage of Bayern Munich it's

29:40

just every German football coverage is centred

29:42

towards Bayern Munich and it is

29:44

representative of the attention on them and of course

29:46

then the financial club that they have so I

29:49

think that Bayern Leverkusen's performance this season does kind

29:51

of go against the grain because they are and

29:54

every other club who's not named Bayern Munich

29:56

are at a disadvantage in terms of their

29:58

the weight within the country but As

30:00

you said, Dortmund almost did it. I

30:03

think because Dortmund almost did it a couple of seasons

30:05

ago, Leavikusen has done it this season, I

30:07

think it's going to anger Bayern Munich, it's

30:09

going to wake the beast even more this

30:11

season. I think they'll put all their energy

30:13

and efforts into just making sure that this

30:16

doesn't happen again because they are such an

30:18

institution that I think that they can't handle

30:20

the political backlash,

30:22

which we're already seeing as it's happened

30:24

this season. So I don't

30:26

know, that's my prediction, but I think

30:29

that we'll almost probably see a return to

30:31

the monopoly. Compared to the other

30:33

top five Euro leagues, Michael, a very

30:35

specific ownership situation and the way the

30:38

clubs are owned and run? Yeah,

30:41

they are supporter owned, at least 50% plus

30:43

one of the shares, or the

30:45

majority of them are. They're very

30:47

proud of that model. I think

30:49

there's unquestionably some great things about

30:51

it, low ticket prices, good community

30:54

links, usually very good atmospheres. Obviously,

30:56

the slight issue is

30:58

that this system has produced an incredibly predictable

31:01

league in recent years and the

31:03

third who have smashed the monopoly are one of

31:05

the few who do not adhere to the 50

31:07

plus one principles. You can

31:09

look at France and you can say the opposite thing. They've

31:12

had outside investors come into PSG and they've made

31:14

that league a complete monopoly

31:16

as well. Clubs

31:19

in Germany are constrained more than equivalents

31:22

in other European leagues. And

31:24

I don't think you're going to get teams who come from

31:26

completely nowhere to compete with Bayern because they just don't have

31:28

the finance to do so, with the

31:30

exception of the two or three sides who

31:33

are run like not German

31:35

clubs. So

31:41

outside of the so-called big

31:44

five European leagues, I found this

31:46

chunk of leagues really interesting,

31:49

Mark, both from a sort of team quality point of view,

31:51

but also the different aspects

31:54

of competitiveness within them. The

31:56

Segunda División in

31:59

Spain. is the next

32:01

strongest league in terms of

32:04

average team quality, which I think

32:06

is fascinating. As for the top

32:08

tiers, you've got Portugal, Russia, Netherlands,

32:10

then Belgium, then the T followed

32:18

by Switzerland and Serie B of

32:20

Italy. So quite a few second

32:22

tiers there. There's really unique aspects

32:24

of the other top tiers that

32:26

we're talking about. For example,

32:28

when we talk about competitiveness, average

32:31

team quality within the Netherlands and

32:33

Portugal in particular is very,

32:36

very skewed by a huge variety in team

32:38

quality at top and bottom. So what does

32:40

that chuck up with those leagues? Yeah, I

32:42

think this is a really interesting discussion on

32:45

this because you do have, I mentioned it

32:47

before, so in the Netherlands you've got IACS,

32:49

maybe not as much this season, but IACS,

32:51

Firenord and MPSV. And in Portugal, you've got

32:54

Porto, Sporting and Benfica. And both

32:56

sides are all of a

32:58

general quality of European level strength

33:00

in terms of competing in the Europa

33:03

League and in the Champions League. And

33:05

the players within that as well do

33:07

move from league to league because they

33:09

are clearly very elite

33:12

players. But when you look at the

33:14

lower echelons of those leagues, the sort

33:16

of level that we're talking about are

33:18

the equivalent of the English Championship

33:21

and League One sides. So if you are

33:23

a player who is let's say a striker

33:25

and you're scoring an average of one

33:27

or two goals a game, that needs

33:29

to be absolutely filled with context that the

33:31

type of opposition you're coming up against is

33:34

a lot weaker. So you're made to look

33:36

potentially like a world beta when you were

33:38

to move into a stronger league

33:40

or a more competitive league or both

33:42

like the Premier League that needs to

33:44

be accounted for from an analytics perspective,

33:47

obviously from a recruitment perspective, to adapt

33:49

and adjust those numbers to think, OK,

33:51

if they were to move into this

33:53

league where, yeah, that quality gap

33:55

is a lot smaller from top to bottom, then

33:57

how will they fair them? So the equivalent of.

34:00

one or two goals becomes zero

34:02

to one goals per 90 minutes in

34:05

the Premier League by way of comparison. So I

34:07

think it does need to be kind of filled

34:09

with context in that regard. And we've seen it

34:11

with some examples from those leagues that we mentioned

34:13

before. So, you know, Antony at

34:15

Manchester United, Nonny Madewejka at Chelsea, Cody

34:18

Gackpow to a certain extent, obviously at

34:20

Liverpool in the area divisi. Not absolutely hit

34:22

the ground running this season, having come straight

34:24

directly from the area divisi and from Portugal,

34:27

again, to a certain extent, there might be

34:29

a bit of debate on this, but Darwin,

34:31

Nunes and Enzo Fernandez, both coming from

34:33

Benfica into the Premier League. I

34:36

think there's a really interesting conversation that we had there. I think

34:38

it's interesting in the context

34:40

of a real name of

34:42

the moment, Victor Yocares, who's scoring so

34:44

many goals for sporting, having scored a

34:47

fair few for Coventry City in the

34:49

championship last season. He's doing it on

34:51

a continental level, as sporting play and

34:53

continental competitions. Within the league level, a

34:55

lot of the teams that he is

34:57

scoring against are, what 21st

34:59

Group would say, of

35:01

a lot lower quality than the worst teams in the

35:03

championship that he was scoring against last year. And yet

35:05

the narrative changes quite strongly, doesn't

35:08

it, Liam? That I think for fans

35:10

of Premier League clubs in particular, it

35:12

seems much more exciting to be buying

35:14

sporting striker scoring 40 goals than Coventry

35:16

City striker scoring 20-25 goals. But

35:19

the difference in purchase price is

35:22

about 50 million. Yeah, and

35:25

it's also then the effect of, and I know Mark's

35:27

done stuff on this before, playing for a dominant team

35:29

and how then important all the state in the game

35:31

in which those goals come as well, that when you're

35:33

in such an attacking team and you are smashing teams

35:35

to bits, you're gonna get greater service that

35:38

you don't need to factor in. So that's not just sort

35:40

of the quality. Then there's even down

35:42

to the individual player level, technical and tactical

35:44

repercussions of, okay, if you're then getting chances

35:46

where you've got more time and more space

35:48

to finish, you can take more touches, you're

35:50

getting more low cutbacks, not so easy chances,

35:52

but there might be less variety than someone

35:54

that's having to sort of score left foot, right foot header,

35:56

chase the channels a lot more. And that one needs to

35:58

just basically be factored in. into the relevance of your own

36:01

team. And if you're saying, look, if this is how we

36:03

want to play, it's part of the reason

36:05

why I maintain that from a Brighton perspective, when they sold

36:07

him as an academy graduate, he made sense to be sold

36:09

at the time. And for better or for worse, that was

36:11

because it was during Graham

36:14

Potter's time at the club, he

36:16

wanted a number nine, he could drop in a lot more,

36:18

play with their back to goal, and Link played to sort

36:20

of these number 10s or the

36:22

attacking sort of fullbacks. People will understandably critique that

36:24

with, they didn't score an awful lot of goals

36:27

in that time, who could have done with a

36:29

striker that scored that number of goals, and he

36:31

consistently came out and said in jumps or windows,

36:34

you know, there's no silver bullet of this

36:36

player that exists in our budget that we

36:38

can certainly pluck from somewhere. And then I

36:41

felt it weird quite nicely talking about what

36:43

people were quite crudely describes like a Bundesliga

36:46

or in other league attacks, but there clearly is

36:48

some truth and some value to this in terms

36:50

of then the adaptation and yeah,

36:53

making that jump from those leagues into one that's got

36:56

high quality, but also different technical and tactical

36:58

demands which impact based on players and their

37:00

tendencies. Yeah, I mean, for me, recruitment and

37:02

quality of players is a slightly different conversation,

37:05

but what I like is competitive title races

37:07

and different teams winning it. And in the

37:09

Netherlands and Portugal, you've got pretty similar

37:11

situation where you've got three really big clubs in

37:14

both countries. It can get a

37:16

bit predictable because it is basically those three

37:18

and everyone else, almost two different divisions within

37:20

one division. But actually

37:22

they're quite unpredictable and competitive from season to

37:25

season. So in the Netherlands, PSV

37:27

are gonna win the league this year, the

37:29

previous season it was Fire and Ord and the previous

37:31

season it was Ajax. You've got three in three. And

37:34

it's a pretty similar situation in Portugal.

37:36

I mean, they've got a situation where

37:38

no one's successfully defending the title. You have

37:40

to go back to 2016 and 2017 when

37:44

Benfica did it. Since then it's

37:46

been Benfica Porto, Benfica Porto, Sporting

37:48

Porto, Benfica and probably Sporting this

37:50

year. So that's kind of

37:52

fine. I mean, this

37:54

is not a new development in these kinds of

37:57

countries. I mean, in Portugal, only

37:59

twice since the second. World War that anyone else

38:01

decides in the Big Three. There's one in the

38:03

league, Bellinences the first year in 46, and

38:06

Boa Vista who came from nowhere to win it in 2001.

38:09

So these countries are basically accustomed to that.

38:11

I think as long as it's different ones

38:13

winning it every season, or pretty close

38:15

to that, then that's pretty much fine. So

38:18

linking this all back to, you mentioned the

38:20

style about the Youth League, it's one of

38:22

the reasons why they valued that coming in

38:24

as a competition in Portugal. One of the

38:26

people that was interviewed, Gail Trejo, for the

38:28

piece, who coached Ben Fica, or their Youth

38:30

League team, the Under-19s for five seasons, and

38:32

they got to the final twice. He said

38:34

that the tournament coming in was huge news

38:36

for us and for Portuguese football because it

38:38

was a greater challenge than the domestic leagues.

38:40

It was the boost that we needed because

38:42

on the national level, the dominance of the

38:44

big teams, the Big Three that Michael's referencing,

38:46

was already well established. And they've got 19s teams

38:48

that will play in an Under-19 league, but they'll then

38:50

have their 21s, often the bigger clubs

38:53

this happens in, Belgium, Portugal, Spain, I

38:55

think as well, and the Netherlands

38:58

that play in a second or third tier and

39:00

will play against senior teams. So they've got that

39:02

balance of that can impact,

39:04

I guess, the competitiveness of those leagues where you

39:07

say we're going to sacrifice the quality of the

39:09

perimeter going all the way down to try and

39:11

make our good players even better and get them

39:13

more tests against people that are more

39:15

experienced, that are physically better because they're going to be really

39:17

good technically, but we want to push them. And

39:20

that's obviously the complete flip side to England

39:22

where the pyramid goes really, really deep and isn't

39:24

then sort of a vessel, if you like,

39:26

for those sort of younger players to come through.

39:29

The Danish Super League have piqued my interest after reading

39:32

this piece. Same for Tien in

39:34

the comments, who said the Danish League

39:36

is quite good. You can find cheaper

39:38

but similarly good players as the area

39:40

divisional Portugal, despite the latter having a

39:42

much better reputation. Three different winners in

39:44

the last four, five years.

39:46

FC Copenhagen have won the last two,

39:48

but it looks like it won't be

39:50

them this time around. So a little

39:53

bit of variability amongst the winners. It's

39:55

also an interesting division in its format

39:57

where the league splits and we get

39:59

a challenge. championship group and we get

40:01

a relegation group. Of course, Michael, there

40:03

are other European leagues where this is

40:05

the case, the top division in Belgium

40:07

being another example where, you know, by

40:10

Premier League standards, there's a bit of funkiness. They

40:12

split things up and they look to decide titles

40:14

just in a slightly different way to how the

40:16

top five Euro leagues work. What do you make

40:19

of different league formats and how they help or

40:21

otherwise with competitiveness? Well, the thing the league format

40:23

has got going for it is one, you can

40:25

be pretty assured that the best team will win

40:27

it. As I've said earlier, I don't think that's

40:29

always a good thing. And of course, you've got the

40:31

history. I mean, in England, going back to the 19th

40:34

century, we've pretty much played the league in the same

40:36

way every year. But I think with

40:38

the differences in quality now, if you're constructing a

40:41

league or a division from scratch,

40:43

you probably just don't have a straight league

40:45

format. And that's why a lot of modern

40:47

competitions, you know, cricket T20, for example, or

40:50

an MLS, you know, America's used to

40:52

playing a playoff at the end of the season,

40:54

you do have a different type

40:57

of way to decide the

40:59

title winners. And you know, it's funny, we're

41:01

very kind of set in our ways in

41:03

that we all agree that domestic titles should

41:05

be a league. We all agree that a

41:07

European Cup should be knockout, World Cup should

41:09

be knockout. There's not necessarily any great logic

41:11

to that aside from you could say maybe

41:13

time constraints. So yeah, I think if

41:16

you're inventing a new league tomorrow, and you've

41:18

got let's say you're in France, do you have

41:20

a straight league format? I think you probably have

41:22

some kind of exciting end of season

41:24

playoffs where other teams do have a

41:27

chance to overhaul PSG, maybe it's more

41:30

interesting television event. And

41:32

I think the split league thing is quite fun as

41:34

well, because I think that's quite a nice blend, where

41:36

it's still a league format. But you do

41:38

have almost like playoffs where you have the

41:40

big teams playing each other. And I

41:43

mean, this is an issue in England, for example,

41:45

in the WSL, where you have a league that

41:48

is increasing in terms of its popularity, it's only

41:50

12 teams at the moment. If you

41:52

expand that to 14 or 16, you're going to risk

41:54

going back to the days where we had like eight

41:56

nil, nine nil kind of scorelines. So

41:58

if the argument, you know, if you... More game.

42:01

And that in itself is a debate because

42:03

maybe try to. Being I played, I think

42:05

that league works quite well. You know from

42:07

a twelve team league. Split. In

42:09

half and then you can have a top half

42:12

playing each other, the bottom off playing each other

42:14

and you have automatically you have more competitive games.

42:16

Really? Interesting and a half to make

42:18

sure we touch on the second

42:20

tier question here because as I

42:22

said earlier, some of them come

42:24

out very strong, certain intensity, average

42:26

team quality model the second division

42:28

in Spain, then the spy to

42:31

Bundesliga, the championships and sorry be

42:33

sad that was the as the

42:35

sort of big for when it

42:37

comes to second tears because they

42:39

are inherently different structurally him that's

42:41

the best. Teams go up every

42:43

yes and the west teams go

42:45

down every year mark So. Intuitively

42:47

to me and swine particular, I

42:49

love the championships. It gives a

42:51

different feel to the league every

42:53

single year. different teams are good

42:55

and poor every single year broadly

42:57

and therefore there is a very

42:59

natural an inherent excitement within the

43:01

the a competitiveness in the structure.

43:03

Those lakes yeah I agree. I

43:05

think it makes complete sense I

43:07

I have a fondness for the

43:09

second the division because of are

43:11

misinformed focus like the fall or

43:13

elevator and that perennially close to

43:15

it to. The playoffs but I think

43:17

that kind of speaks the competitors point because

43:20

it is always so close that you are

43:22

much like that. Being the championships you are

43:24

only a couple of wins away from kind

43:26

of reaching the the top six or for

43:28

whatever it may be and at the moment

43:30

in the second tier in Spain has only

43:32

eleven points separating the top eleven games. Size.

43:35

that sporting utopia survey yeah and leg and

43:37

s a top of the league and they

43:40

have to sixty three points and they played

43:42

i think thirty six games maybe just shy

43:44

of it and they've drawn for the last

43:46

five which is not form for someone who

43:48

should be this to suffer the league and

43:50

yet again it's be sued the point you

43:52

made statistically that quality gasp and is just

43:54

talking about the rains here the second division

43:56

has the smallest out from from top to

43:59

bottom of the twenty that we discussed. So

44:01

it's hugely interesting, as are a lot of

44:03

the, as you mentioned, the second divisions and

44:05

there's that element of peril. Obviously you get

44:08

to be promoted into the European

44:11

leagues if you win it or get in the

44:13

top two or three. So yeah,

44:15

it's hugely competitive with lucrative rewards and

44:17

it makes sense that there is a

44:20

cluster of similar quality teams as a

44:22

consequence. This

44:24

often seems to be the case in the

44:26

Spanish second division and I think it's partly

44:28

to deal with away travel. I mean it's

44:31

a very big country Spain. It's not that

44:33

easy to navigate. They don't have that much

44:35

culture of away fans. I mean even in

44:37

La Liga, if the away team scores

44:40

a goal and the camera goes to the fans, you

44:42

have like 150 fans at like massive grounds and

44:45

just looking at the league table at

44:47

the moment, everyone's played about

44:49

18 away games. No one's won more than eight

44:52

of them on the road with

44:54

Leganes. They're from Madrid, so it's probably

44:56

relatively easy to travel for them. Anyway, that's probably getting

44:58

too far away from the point, but it is a

45:00

bit of a feature in Spain. The

45:02

Segunda is always really competitive. I

45:04

think that's really interesting and within your

45:06

answer I've pulled up the current season

45:09

stats for the Segunda division in

45:11

which the away team has only won 23% of total

45:13

matches this season

45:15

in the championship where there's a much bigger

45:17

onus on away travel and much smaller distances

45:20

to travel. The away teams have won 32%

45:22

of the game, so it's almost a 10%

45:26

difference there in away win percentage. Very

45:28

good, Michael. Very good. There was a

45:30

comment from Jamie H that said, I

45:32

reckon a European competition with the championship,

45:34

second Bundesliga, Segunda division and Serie B would

45:37

be decent. Now part of me thinks we've

45:39

got enough competitions at the moment to wrap

45:41

our heads around, but a lot of me

45:43

thinks that would be very, very interesting just

45:45

from a sort of footballing perspective to see

45:48

how those second tier teams would

45:50

mesh together. You could do an end of

45:52

season, you know, playoffs, like get four of

45:54

semi-finals final. It would be a bit weird

45:56

if you did it like the main European

45:58

competitions because obviously it would be... the winners

46:00

of the championship who would then be in the

46:02

Premier League and struggling. That would just seem really

46:04

weird. But end of season, when

46:06

the FA Cup final was going on, could

46:09

be a good alternative. It's worth a brainstorm

46:11

at the very least, somewhere in Nijon, no

46:13

doubt. So

46:15

many aspects of this whole conversation,

46:17

so many unique variables across different

46:19

divisions and different nations. Mark, this

46:21

has been occupying your mind now

46:23

for over two weeks. So what

46:25

would you say you have learned

46:27

from researching competitiveness to that level?

46:30

I think in general, it's interesting

46:32

to move away from the league

46:34

strength. Everyone's so obsessed, especially recently, with

46:36

the easy way for coefficients. And my

46:39

league's better than your league and all that sort

46:41

of chat. And I think it's just so much

46:43

more interesting to speak about the peril

46:45

of the league, the competitiveness of the league in

46:47

terms of the entertainment value, irrespective

46:50

of strength of the league or the

46:52

players themselves. How do you like to

46:54

sort of consume your football? And

46:56

how much of a virtuous cycle it is to

46:59

have that greatest competitiveness, that then attracts more attention

47:01

to that league more broadly, and then that in

47:03

turn can make it stronger and you can kind

47:05

of build from the foundation up. So I think

47:07

that's one of them. The second one

47:09

would be that recruitment perspective that we've

47:11

already spoken about. But again, I'm obviously

47:13

very interested from an analytics perspective, and

47:16

it's so important to add that context

47:18

to it. If you're looking to sign a

47:20

player from an already dominant side, acknowledging that

47:22

gap from top to bottom, that disparity between

47:25

certain teams and adapting that output that they

47:27

have. So I think those are my two

47:29

main ones. And let's have it right as

47:31

well, by the way, that this is going

47:33

on within clubs in terms of adapting their

47:35

analytics and the quality of the league. That's

47:37

why you're not often going to get that

47:41

player move from the Danish Super League directly

47:43

into the Premier League because of that lack

47:45

of competitiveness in certain situations. Well,

47:47

well done, Mark, and thank you for

47:49

bringing this to our door. There was

47:51

a predictably tedious cabal of people responding

47:53

to your article by saying this was

47:55

some way of you coping with

47:57

the Premier League clubs being knocked out of

48:00

it. various UEFA competitions. But I think and

48:02

I hope we've proven over the last hour

48:04

or so that there's a little more to

48:06

it than that. Thank you for listening to

48:09

this week's Athletic Football Tactics podcast. We hope

48:11

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