Replace Ascoli with Bologna, and nothing changes. The point is go down the table of any league pre-Bosman, and you'll quickly run out of top teams with top players. You've found 8 legit contenders in any league? Man, I wish I could watch a league competition with your eyes. La Liga hasn't had 8 different clubs as champions in almost their entire history. Anyway, I don't know what you're doing. Real Sociedad is an example of the lack of class in the EC, but you're arguing for the merits of Gijon?
More like replace with Inter or Roma. --- In the late 1990s, 7 of the 18 teams in Serie A were very strong. Yeah, the EC/CL has more good teams obviously, but you don't actually have to play them all. In back-to back seasons, Juve got all the way to the CL final by playing at most 1 or 2 top teams, and not necessarily even winning those games. The rest of the opponents were probably inferior to any of the "big 7" in Serie A. But even that would be considered a difficult route to the final compared to most EC campaigns pre-1990. Yup, and proved it with actual data. QED
Barcelona 2011 also played with 10 men against Real when Messi scored his brace... way to omit that factoid. Arsenal 2009 was Ronaldo's best SF performance but it's still a step below Madrid 2011 and Bayern 2015. Most people would agree with that, not just Barca fans. And you make yourself sound ignorant when you call a 2-goal cushion a "miniscule advantage". In football terms, a 2-0 lead is close to insurmountable. For every comeback from a 2-goal deficit, there are many many instances where the said comeback doesn't occur. And the two cases I mentioned of meaningless goals were Bayern 13/14 and Atletico 13/14. Real was up 3-0 on aggregate (not 2-0) with an away goal advantage so Bayern would need to score 4 goals in about 70 minutes... Ronaldo then scored one meaningless goal and then another one even more meaningless up 4-0 on aggregate in the closing minutes. In the final against Atletico, Real was up 3-1 in extra time and in the 120th minute, Ronaldo scored a penalty. I'm sorry but those are meaningless goals. And it's not really debatable.
Yes, it is subjective. But why narrow yourself to a black or white argument? Simply put, a goal to make it 1- or 2-nil is objectively more important than a goal to make it 3- or 4-nil, even if all are meaningful to some degree.
And won the CWC fewer times than EC/CL. It's a non-sequitur. You can't get in to the EC without winning the league so....
That wasn’t his argument His argument was that scoring a 3-0,4-0,5-0 goal etc is worthless That runs counter intuitive to the essence of the game which is to win and to win by a convincing margin if you are able to Talking about what can be objectively proven 13 goals is a demonstrably superior return than 4 goals and I don’t see how anybody could argue against that @Danko just to show you the logical fallacy of your claim According to you Ronaldo has been a demonstrably superior performer than Messi in champions league quarter finals (I know you say this begrudgingly but credit for at least admitting so) The QF rounds precede the SF which can explain why ronaldo has had more chances to play in SFs(by virtue of his output in QF rounds during which he has singlehandedly decided several ties vs Atletico in 2015,Wolfsburg 2016,Bayern Munich 2017,juventus 2018 even scoring the winner in the 2014 QF vs Dortmund, Messi has consistently failed to impact champions league quarterfinals and by virtue of this fact has played less SF fixtures His goal+assist average in SF ties when he has played is considerably less than ronaldo (at least 50% less) Messi scored all his 4 goals when the opposing teams were at a disadvantage especially with Bayern Munich 14/15 Missing arguably their top 3 outfield players in both fixtures A Bayern side missing robben/ribery/alaba is definitely not better than Arsenal 08/09 Messi scored both his goals against Real Madrid when they were a man down When they were at full strength he could not score So these supposed goat level performances came against teams who weren’t at their full strength Messi’s 2011 champions league final performance came against a overrated Manchester United team who progressed beyond the SF by beating a team that finished 14th place in Bundesliga(schalke) Really Messi never faced a legitimately great side at full strength and was the clear best player in the QF to Final rounds of the CL I defy you to show me one example
Nah, you found a league with 7 competitors. Which was such a historical anomaly it's still looked at with wide-eyed wonder. And even with 7 "competitors", it was still Milan or Juve who won every season, though combined they could only win one CL. It's funny you should mention Juventus, considering they're like Exhibit A on how much more difficult it is to win a CL. Ask Buffon how many of his 40 Scudetti he'd trade for one CL. But that's not important. This is the important part:
No I am not. If Romario cared about CL, he wouldn't have left Europe in his prime. I think that's pretty clear. Romario went to Europe probably barely knowing what European Cup was. He only left Brazil for money. Not for fame. Not for the competition. It reflects badly only your opinion of him. He didn't flee level of competition because it was too hard for him. He just wanted to be in Rio. Good for him for not caring what people think about him. His dream was to win the World Cup, not some European title that meant nothing to him. And he achieved that. In one try.
Don't be an idiot. I meant that it didn't matter to us. The world wasn't as globalized as it is today. Our players mostly stayed at home and didn't go to Europe. Why should we have cared ? I will say this again, SA players didn't go to Europe in the 70s, 80s, 90s because of the higher level of competition. They went because of money. Today, they go for both.
Really this is laughable Romario was clever enough to make the transition from footballer to politician but not clever enough to realise that the champions league was Europe’s premier competition Barcelona entered the final as heavy favourites vs Milan and this can easily be substantiated with the Catalan press also dubbing it match of the century Savecivic and co put them to the sword in literally the most one sided embarrassing final in history That was a defeat Barcelona did not recover from for several years The fact is Romario won the WC 94 by luck (penalty miss by baresi and baggio) And won La Liga by luck thanks to a penalty miss by deportivo la coruna on the final day of the season Without 1994 the myth of Romario doesn’t exist and all we’re left with is goals scored in Brazil and eredivisie He’d be remembered as a great league player like greaves,ibrahimovic,Riva etc Instead of this mythical version of his that has been perpetuated into existence by Brazilian/Barcelona fans for the last 2 or so decades
That's not what I said. I said, in the rank of important things FOR ROMARIO, the CL wasn't that high. I bet it was just another game in Europe for him. Of course he was told it was important when he was at Barca. I am saying his mindset coming into Europe wasn't to win the CL, it was to make money. Glory for him was the WC ... and it's not even close to anything else. Romario made his PK. And we both know how much you value those.
Well, with 6 or 7 league titles in-a-row Juve might be the perfect example for a team that would trade a league title for a CL title right about now, but there are many teams that haven't won a league title and for them the league is their #1 priority. Less so today than in the past, mind you...
What Romario thinks is only important and relevant to himself. He made certain life choices that were appropriate to his circumstances We are talking about football not about what made him happy as an individual From the perspective of the game he made a terrible choice by leaving Europe during his prime to go back home and compete at a much lower standard That is what is being discussed here Just because Romario did not view the CL as a priority for himself doesn’t mean the competition was any less important
in Brazil , at least until mid 90s , maybe the EC /CL final was televised . But I don’t even remember even if the final was televised.
Difference is CR7 singlehandedly decided several fixtures in QF to final rounds that a few poor performances in finals can be overlooked Romario decided nothing in champions league QF to final rounds And merely scored 2 goals at the same stage in the World Cup against Sweden and the Netherlands That is his legacy so don’t compare peanuts to mountains
That’s why I always said to him . Although i still believe the importance of CL vs leagues had increased dramatically since 15 years ago. Gap between Brazil and European leagues was not that big in the 90s. And by that I mean Italy and Spain top teams . The top Brazilian teams could compete with them . Today it’s not even close .
To get a better understanding of football, and not make yourself a laughing stock when talking about football globally? No one takes a navel-gazing insularist seriously. That much is obvious. Most professional footballers follow the money. That's why having the money leads to having the higher level of competition.
No that wasn't my argument. I never once mentioned a 3-0 goal. I said that a 4-0 goal with away goals advantage is a largely meaningless goal. And that a 5-0 goal in the closing minutes is total statpadding. And that a 4-1 goal in the closing minutes is total statpadding. How any of those things are debatable baffles me. You don't seem to understand the concept of sample size. With SF and Finals of the champions league we are talking about a dozen or two dozen matches in a 15-year career. In that case, context tells most of the story. 13-4 is fact but the meaning of that edge or in this case lack thereof can be analyzed. Where is my big logical fallacy? Do you know what the word fallacy means? No offense but I didn't understand your point. Yes Ronaldo is better in the QF and yes it did help his team get to more SF. The part about facing full strength teams is BS. Barca also had 10 men against 10 men Madrid in 2011. Bayern 2015 was still stacked with Lewa, Muller, Thiago, Schwein, Xabi Alonso, Boateng, Lahm, Benatia, Neuer etc. The notion that this was a lacking team is laughable. They were 15 minutes from getting a 0-0 draw at Camp Nou and then Messi took over.
LMFAO You proceed to list names as if I’m Supposed to be impressed Players like muller who scored 1 goal in the CL,Thiago,a past it schweinsteiger who was promptly sold to Manchester United a past it xabi Alonso who was offloaded by Real Madrid for that exact same reason etc Fact is they had as a truly World class attacker Robert Lewandowski facing Lionel Messi+Suarez+Neymar With robben+ribery that seems a less daunting prospect without them it’s a hopeless cause Barcelona played with all Their outfield players in the home fixture vs Madrid (where Messi scored twice) Pepe was sent of for Real Madrid with the game still at 0-0 Literally Pepe was sent off 44 seconds into that match so Barcelona had an advantage from the very start These are all facts (ie something you seem to struggle grappling with) Messi has not scored a single champions league SF goal Against a team at full strength. if I am lying present your sources to counter my claim
No. A proper comparison would be if I only followed the football in, say, the English league. I don't think I need to tell you that Europe is, and always has been, the center of football. To be ignorant of European football is to be ignorant of football, period. No one has the time to follow everything, so I've had to limit myself to top football only. South American football at the moment is unfortunately just a low-tier periphery, comparable to Africa or Asia. Even Finland showed Brazilian and Copa America football in the 80s, so yes. Of course the focus has been on the bigger leagues. Moreover, European sports publications have covered South American football through correspondents who had expertise on both Euro- and SA-football. This allowed European football enthusiasts to receive an accurate picture of the strength level of SA-football.