AmexRuislip
Retired Spy 🕵️♂️
[tweet]1425401416214933507[/tweet]
I agree, imagine only being offered £250k a week ? I'm not sure how someone with millions in the bank could survive on that. He's got mouths to feed.
Its probably not the best league at this moment due to lots of players leaving as a result of covid crashing the Spanish football economy. But it certainly has been for most of his spell there. Its not just Real Madrid / Barcelona - other teams frequently beat the shit out of English teams in the Europa League and friendlies. The Premier League is more hyped and got more money and more expensive players, but yet again and again when English and Spanish teams meet it appears that the random Jose or Javier no one has heard of is equally good as those expensive names gathered across the world.
Messi has proven he is capable of destroying English teams, over and over again. They might be "tougher" and "more physical" - maybe - but Messi has destroyed them over and over again. In 34 games against English teams - all of them top teams - Messi scored 26 goals and 6 assists. I doubt anyone, in the PL or outside it, got a record anywhere near that. Yet I'm supposed to believe that he couldnt deal with Shane Duffy?
England is the only place in the world where people even discuss on whether he could dominate in the PL. It was the same thing about Zlatan Ibrahimovic before he casually scored four against England and then carried a shite United team to a second place in the PL.
While money certainly played a role in his decision, and that would also have been the case if he went to your preferred destination, I dont think its the only reason - he also wants to win things, and the chances of doing that alongside Neymar (who by the way would also be decent in the PL) and Mbappe looks pretty good.
Not saying you're right or wrong but you really shouldn't take friendlies at all seriously. They are totally meaningless.The English clubs have more money but are generally not better as we saw first hand at the weekend.
And yet they only won the cup last year. The question is can Pochettino build a balanced team with those players, individuals will win you games occasionally but good teams will always win the trophies.
I agree with your comments on Messi but will take issue with the bit in bold and the conclusion you draw over English & Spanish club standards. Firstly, English and Spanish clubs have traditionally been closely matched - in European competition, the all time record is Pl 335 Eng 108 Draw 95 Spa 132
http://www.eurocupshistory.com/matc...gland_against_spain_in_uefa_club_competitions
That small difference in favour of Spain can be at least partly explained by attitude differences to UEFA's secondary competition. In England, no club takes the Europa League anything like as seriously as Premier league performance until they reach the final 8 or 16. This is because the riches of the PL vastly outweigh the secondary competition which isn't the case in Spain where the distribution of wealth across teams in the top division is grotesquely skewed towards 2 clubs (4 at most) because Spanish teams are allowed to negotiate their own TV deals. Just look at the difference:
Spain: The top two earned twice as much in TV revenue as the 5th richest club!
https://www.forbes.com/sites/bobbym...teams-receive-record-payouts/?sh=189e45c427ab
England: The top club earned twice as much in TV revenue as the BOTTOM club!
https://www.statista.com/statistics...ments-to-clubs-in-the-english-premier-league/
And why are you talking about friendlies as if they are any sort of barometer? They mean absolutely f**k all. On the other hand, you talk about how the PL has the most money and expensive players, but won't accept that those expensive players are on average better than those that cost less playing in another league. That's just dumb.
Not saying you're right or wrong but you really shouldn't take friendlies at all seriously. They are totally meaningless.