It was a chastening week for the Premier League teams in the UEFA Champions League.
Chelsea, Manchester City, Newcastle United and Tottenham Hotspur were hit for a combined 28 goals across the two legs of their last-16 ties, at an incredible average of 3.5 per leg.
The sheer gulf in class on show from Paris Saint-Germain against Chelsea was clear to see. The Blues are still getting to grips with a(nother) new manager while PSG remain European champions with a litany of star names working under arguably the best manager in the world.
Newcastle should have beaten Barcelona at St James’ Park in the first leg, but it was men against boys at Camp Nou. Even with Newcastle’s two first-half equalisers, Barcelona always looked comfortable enough.
Tottenham, who finished 17th in the Premier League last season, are firmly embroiled in a relegation battle this time around, and there’s been little from Igor Tudor – who bizarrely started, and then replaced, backup goalkeeper Antonin Kinsky in the first leg against Atletico Madrid, leading to a 5-2 thrashing – to suggest he’s the man to haul them out of it.
Naturally it’s led to much mirth from those who like to put the Premier League down, with record postings of the ‘are we the farmers?’ meme. In fairness, it was a miserable showing from England’s representatives but don’t kid yourself into thinking the Premier League isn’t still by far and away the best league in the world, which still has every chance of boasting the UEFA Champions League, UEFA Europa League and UEFA Conference League winners come May.
Looking at the English sides in this season’s UEFA Champions League, you have Tottenham, who fluked their way to the top table by beating Ruben Amorim’s Manchester United in the Europa League final last season, and remain one of the worst teams in the Premier League; there’s Chelsea who sacked the manager who won the Club World Cup and got them into the UEFA Champions League and replaced him with Liam Rosenior who may also find himself out of a job in 12 months’ time; and Newcastle who have again struggled to juggle European and domestic commitments following a poor summer transfer window.
It’s also worth pointing out the level of opposition these sides have faced. While people may be questioning the Premier League’s strength, were any of Tottenham, Newcastle, or Chelsea really expected to beat Atletico Madrid, Barcelona or Paris Saint-Germain?
It was only a couple of months ago, remember, that five of the six English representatives booked their place in the last-16 via top-eight finishes in the league phase. Tottenham were one of them, winning five of their eight league phase games. Incidentally, Spurs failed to win a single Premier League game after winning in Europe.
The strength of the Premier League also weakens its hand in Europe. While Chelsea and Newcastle were slogging it out on Saturday with Tottenham travelling to Anfield on Sunday, Real Madrid, Barcelona and Atletico Madrid were facing the more tepid opposition of Elche, Sevilla and Getafe at home. Paris Saint-Germain had the weekend off.
Premier League clubs aren’t afforded the same luxury. There’s hardly time to breathe. Liverpool are clinging on to a UEFA Champions League place, Chelsea are one point behind them, Newcastle are three points out of the Europa League spots, Tottenham have been dragged into a relegation battle, Manchester City are close to being eliminated from the title race. Every game is huge at this time of the season, and the standard of the opponents they face every week is much stiffer than that of the Spanish and French sides.
Once you get past the elite of each league -- which is all much of a muchness between Arsenal, Manchester City, Liverpool, Paris Saint-Germain, Bayern Munich, Real Madrid and Barcelona -- the quality drops off significantly everywhere with the exception of the Premier League.
No doubt it was a bad week for the English clubs, but they’ll retain the extra UEFA Champions League place for next season, and the betting suggests they’ll have this year’s winner, too.
