Fact or Fiction: The J-league is the best domestic league in Asia

Korea still has an American style post-season championship to determine the league champions. Completely obliterates the meaning of the regular season. Get your act together Korea!

 

I can only base my judgement of leagues on when Australian clubs play in the ACL, so I have little knowledge of West Asian clubs... I'll have to trust the judges here on the strength of the Saudi League.

J-League is far and away the best I've seen, with Aussie clubs struggling so far, although it doesn't help that our champions from the previous season are always well below their championship form. I'm sad that Brisbane couldn't go straight into the ACL in their current form, they would have been very competitive.

I'm also impressed with the Koreans, with their top clubs as strong as J-League IMO... but maybe the J-League just has that little bit more depth in quality.

CSL teams should be doing much better... they have the budget and quality to play much better football... however, every time I see their teams they play football for about 15 mins, then turn their attention to Olympic diving, Oscar-winning acting, grass-rolling techniques and blatant cheating. Very disappointing. When they concentrate on football, they could be so much better. It's a pity, because it's holding them back IMO.

 

IMO best league of Asia is K-League
K-League - first tier league of Asia
Second tier league includs Iran League, CSL,J-League and A-League
Uzbek league,Saudi League and UAE League Qatar League, Thailand League,Vietnam League and Hong Kong League are third tier

 

in 2009 i would of said the J.League far and away.

these days, im not really sure. in terms of infrastructure it's still the best, id say they still have a healthy pipeline when it comes to producing talent but collectively as a team when you break down their teams they aren't as good as they were around 6-8 years ago.

that could be down to the economic downturn post tsunami, maybe something that we dont even know as outsiders, or maybe even the rest of asia catching up which is what i believe anyway.

if i was going to model the a-league on another league i would still look at the japanese model ahead of the others but i believe the k-league is either just as good, or even better than it if we are looking at the collective quality of the teams. they both produce plenty of good young talent that is exported to europe, which is something the csl isnt doing(or perhaps maybe it isnt even their aim? i dont know).

the csl has a huge vision, clubs with plenty of money and a huge growing fanbase that is already the biggest in asia, its hard to rate it at the moment because i guarantee in 5 years time it will be totally different(even better than it is now). the foreigners that play in it are among not just the best in asia, but players that could just about play in any league in the world. the local players though...still got some catching up to do in my opinion.

and lastly the a-league well - from a professional standpoint its pretty good, but not enough teams, no pro-rel. pipeline of talent is getting better. salary cap is a bit too restrictive but in the end it has good crowds and fan interaction + the balance between foreign and local players in terms of quality is very good(in most cases anyway)

ive no idea what the leagues are like in the middle east

 

Uzbek league, IPL and UAE league are ok in West and Central Asia. Qataris are slowly become better, Saudis are in hibernation now, they used to be a lot better.

 

if our clubs had only third of Arab clubs' budget and their foreign stars it would be impossible to find empty seats in our stadiums, even now provincial stadiums are almost full, just capital city Tashkent can't impress with their fans,, when Scolari, Zico, Rivaldo and other prominent people worked here Tashkent people used to fill stadiums, even during the matches of national team stadiums are full thanks to people coming from provinces

 

^ this is market value not the quality of leagues ranking in AFC. Btw, Uzbek league market value is somewhere around 45-50 M Euro. I extracted from Transfermarkt.com .

Uzbek League 2015/2016 according available data. (Total Market Value 45 Mill €)
1.Lokomotiv Tashkent 8.13 Mill €
http://www.transfermarkt.com/lokomotiv-tashkent/startseite/verein/15309
2.Pakhtakor 7.5 Mill €
http://www.transfermarkt.com/pakhtakor-tashkent/startseite/verein/3718
3.FC Bunyodkor 6.08 Mill €
http://www.transfermarkt.com/fc-bunyodkor/startseite/verein/19401
4.Nasaf Qarshi 5.10 Mill €
http://www.transfermarkt.com/nasaf-qarshi/startseite/verein/20591
5.FK Buxoro 3.9 Mill €
http://www.transfermarkt.com/fc-bukhara/startseite/verein/20151
6.Olmaliq FK 3.03 Mill €
http://www.transfermarkt.com/fk-olmaliq/startseite/verein/31216
7.Navbahor Namangan 2.25 Mill €
http://www.transfermarkt.com/navbahor-namangan/startseite/verein/15310
8.Neftchi Fergana 2.0 Mill €
http://www.transfermarkt.com/neftchi-fergana/startseite/verein/13306
9.Qizilqum Zarafshon 1.4 Mill €
http://www.transfermarkt.com/kyzylkum-zarafshan/startseite/verein/20115
10.FC Shurtan Guzar 1.05 Mill €
http://www.transfermarkt.com/shurtan-guzar/startseite/verein/15315
11.FK Andijan 0.95 Mill €
http://www.transfermarkt.com/fk-andijan/startseite/verein/20099
12.Kokand 1912 0.95 Mill €
http://www.transfermarkt.com/fk-kokand-1912/startseite/verein/53299
13.Sogdiana Jizzakh 0.85 Mill €
http://www.transfermarkt.com/fc-sogdiana-djizzak/startseite/verein/35157
14.FK Mash'al Mubarek 0.85 Mill €
http://www.transfermarkt.com/fk-mashal-mubarek/startseite/verein/13649
15.PFK Metallurg Bekabad 0.525 Mill €
http://www.transfermarkt.com/metalurg-bekabad/startseite/verein/20117
16.Obod Tashkent 0.40 Mill €
http://www.transfermarkt.com/fk-obod-tashkent/startseite/verein/53566

 

I think China football league is definitely the best league in asia now and maybe for the coming decades if not centuries, j/k.

 

I apologize for not including all teams in the AFC. I just found this on social media and posted it here. Thanks for adding the Uzbek league. Thought it would be a good idea to compare the market values of AFC leagues to add to the discussion.

 

AFC MA rankings as of June 3rd 2016

http://www.the-afc.com/uploads/afc/files/afc_ma_rankings_03062016.pdf

 

http://www.transfermarkt.com/wettbewerbe/asien

South Korea only has 8.6% of foreign players.

The Chinese league market value was 130 million euros in 2014, 180 million in 2015, and 320 million in 2016.