Results from a knockout tournament can be deliciously unclear. Oakland and Saint Peter’s can defeat Kentucky. The New England Patriots can lose against the New York Giants (twice). Morocco has the ability to defeat Portugal and Spain consecutively, and the Premier League—by far the richest soccer league—has the potential to collapse in UEFA tournaments.
Many English dreams and narratives were dashed in the Champions League and Europa League quarterfinal round of fixtures. Following a second consecutive knockout loss to Real Madrid in three years and a decisive spot kick by Antonio Rüdiger, Manchester City’s hopes of winning the “Double Treble” vanished. A late collapse against Atalanta ended Liverpool’s chances of sending Jurgen Klopp into retirement with his own special triple of winning the League Cup, Europa League, and Premier League.
Though overall Arsenal’s comeback is still underway, its chances of making it to a Champions League semifinal for the first time in fifteen years ended in Munich, the same location many of its aspirations for the competition have ended in the twenty-first century. England was only kept in contention by Villa’s thrilling victory against Lille in the Europa Conference League, which was made possible by a bizarre goal late in regulation, as West Ham also lost to Bayer Leverkusen.
Barcelona, meanwhile, lost both their lead and their composure against PSG; Germany’s two biggest teams are in the Champions League semifinals for the first time in eleven years; and Bayer Leverkusen, which defeated those two heavyweights this season with eight points in four games, is still unbeaten in the Europa League.
We usually head straight to the narrative machine following an exciting result, even though these tournaments are completely random. The Premier League has much too much hype! Ignored is the Bundesliga! PSG had a well-laid plan from the start! Let’s discuss what we truly learned—and didn’t—from these amazing quarterfinal rounds now that we have a few days to process what we witnessed.
Although money is important, everything else is as well
Even though the Premier League is easily the finest league in Europe (and, thus, the world), it should probably go without saying. But just in case. It has the highest salary, depth, roster worth, and so forth. It has produced seven finalists in the previous six Champions Leagues before to this one. Additionally, twenty Premier League teams earn about the same total revenue as all 38 La Liga and Bundesliga teams, all 642 clubs in Europe’s bottom 50 nations, and all 20 clubs in the Premier League, according to UEFA’s most recent benchmarking study.
But it was almost consoling to learn that a league’s financial might isn’t the only factor that matters. The Premier League has failed to translate depth into significant European success in the last two seasons. Although West Ham (in the Europa Conference League) and Manchester City (in the Champions League) were the only two English teams to win their respective competitions last spring, only Chelsea (in the Champions League) and Manchester United (in the Europa League) made it as far as the quarterfinals. The only two English teams to go past their groups’ elimination stages in the Champions League this season were Newcastle and Manchester United, who both lost in the quarterfinals.
For as much as the Premier League has distanced itself from the field in a financial sense, it hasn’t distanced itself enough to overcome the “Stuff Happens principle” of knockout tournaments. Arsenal’s Mikel Arteta got outschemed by Bayern’s Thomas Tuchel, just as Liverpool’s Jurgen Klopp did against Atalanta’s Gian Piero Gasperini. (I know Liverpool isn’t going to hire the 66-year-old to replace Klopp, but damn, is that a pretty sexy thought all the same.)
During the course of two legs, City appeared to outperform Real Madrid, trying 45 attempts against the Blancos’ 22, producing 3.5 xG, and giving up just 2.1. But they were unable to create many good chances, and they lost to Real Madrid’s sudden genius and penalty shootout.
Neither were the Champions League quarterfinal outcomes a triumph for European parity. The Premier League may be the richest league in the world, but the semifinalists from this year still placed first (Real Madrid), fourth (PSG), sixth (Bayern), and 12th (Borussia Dortmund) in terms of overall revenue in 2023; in fact, the only “upset” of the quarterfinals was PSG’s victory over Barcelona, which came in third place in terms of revenue.
However, the richest league didn’t yield the richest outcomes, which resulted in a significant shift in the coefficient race. The nations with the highest overall success in the three UEFA tournaments will receive two bids each into the newly enlarged Champions League of the following year.After the respective UEFA rounds of 16, Opta’s power ratings gave England an 82% chance of winning the other bid. Italy has secured one of those bids thanks to strong runs in the Europa League (where it had three quarterfinalists and two semifinalists) and Europa Conference League (where Fiorentina is in the semifinals for the second straight year).
That’s how surprising the outcomes were; after the quarterfinals, those odds are now at 1%, with Germany at 99%. The race might shift back toward the Premier League if Villa defeats Olympiacos in both legs of their Europa Conference League semifinal match and wins the championship, while all of Germany’s remaining entrants lose in the semifinals and either win one or draw two matches or lose all of them. You never know what could occur. However, the odds are not good. It seems that the richest league in the world won’t have the most Champions League berths the next season.
The Europa League edition of The Golazo Show, a USL Championship doubleheader and the decisive second leg of the MASL Championship highlight free live matches on CBS Sports Golazo Network this week.
— CBS Sports PR (@CBSSportsGang) April 30, 2024
Watch every match plus Morning Footy, Box 2 Box,… pic.twitter.com/57UHsVLGsM
Quality triumphs over quantity for Real Madrid once more
Real Madrid defeated Liverpool in the Champions League final two years ago despite being outshot 24–4. Even though Real Madrid seems to be luckier than anybody else in the Champions League, it wasn’t all bad luck. Even though they were vastly outshot, they nonetheless produced the greatest shots of the game, which ultimately decided the outcome. As I stated at the time, “In soccer, one valuable goal opportunity can have a significant impact, particularly in a knockout match with comparable skill levels and high stakes. In the short run, the large odds are the most significant; however, over time, the little xG values add up and become significant.
The final phase of the Arsenal concept is to target quality teams
“Where was this?” was all I could think to ask after seeing Arsenal defeat Chelsea and Tottenham Hotspur by a combined score of 8-2 last week. It helped them reach 85 Premier League goals for the season, the most in the league, and kept them in the running for the crown, with Opta now giving Arsenal a 35% chance to win to Manchester City’s 65%. Liverpool is all but out from the competition. Their very captivating moments of outstanding offensive play. However, hardly none of them play against elite teams.
With Opta power ratings, a 90.0 score places you roughly in the top 20 in Europe. The 20 clubs with the best records across all competitions this season, while playing opponents with a rating of 90 or above at the time of the match, are included in this table. Stated differently, these are the European teams that have performed very well against the greatest.
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