No.
I spoke about this on the podcast yesterday, but in light of this Daniel Taylor op-ed, it’s worth spelling out in detail. Wednesday saw of one Arsenal’s most humiliating nights in recent history—a 4-0 Champions League loss to AC Milan at the San Siro. The undercurrent before the match was Serie A’s perceived decline when held up against the Premier League’s perceived dominance, the European footballing equivalent of “my dad could beat up your dad.”
While there is nothing more satisfying than a wonderful European night, a single match is not very useful when comparing the relative quality of two domestic leagues. One can understand the pundit going down this road (the vast, wasteful bulk of sports writing is, as Richard Ford once wrote, “idle speculation”), but Arrigo Sacchi?
“Look at the Premier League,” [Sacchi] said. “They are a long way behind the two Manchester clubs, both of whom are already out of the Champions League. This just underlines the decline of English football.”
Sacchi is a football manager, not a statistician, but even he should know the importance of sample size. His earlier remarks about the North London club—they’re the worst Arsenal side he’s seen in at least ten years—are certainly fair, as the result caps off what has a been an inconsistent season for Arsene Wenger’s team. But to extrapolate from a 4-0 shellacking that English football is in decline, even with Napoli’s result against Manchester City in the group stage, is naive.
In order to determine the thorny issue of which European leagues deserve more Champions League places, UEFA has in place its “association” (league) coefficient ranking. Wikipedia has the relevant details:
This coefficient is determined by the results of the clubs of the leagues in UEFA Champions League and UEFA Europa League games over the past five seasons. Two points are awarded for each win by a club, and one for a draw (points are halved in the qualifying and playoff rounds). Goals scored in extra time do count in determining the outcome of a game, but any Penalty shootout result does not affect the allocation of points other than the bonus points. The number of points awarded each season is divided by the number of teams that participated for that nation in that season. This number is then rounded to three decimal places (e.g. 2⅔ would be rounded to 2.667).
This is about a fair assessment as you can find to determine whether in fact Serie A is on the rise and England is on the decline. Here’s the most recent ranking, including the points total from European competition thus far this season:
| Rank 2012 |
Rank 2011 |
Mvmt. | League | 2007–08 | 2008–09 | 2009–10 | 2010–11 | 2011–12 | Coeff. | Teams 2011–12 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 |  — |
 England |
17.875 | 15.000 | 17.928 | 18.357 | 12.875 | 82.035 | 5/8 |
| 2 | 2 | — |
 Spain |
13.875 | 13.312 | 17.928 | 18.214 | 12.142 | 75.471 | 5/7 |
| 3 | 3 | — |
 Germany |
13.500 | 12.687 | 18.083 | 15.666 | 11.250 | 71.186 | 4/6 |
| 4 | 4 | — |
 Italy |
10.250 | 11.375 | 15.428 | 11.571 | 9.928 | 58.552 | 5/7 |
| 5 | 5 | — |
 France |
6.928 | 11.000 | 15.000 | 10.750 | 10.000 | 53.678 | 2/6 |
| 6 | 6 | — |
 Portugal |
7.928 | 6.785 | 10.000 | 18.800 | 9.166 | 52.679 | 4/6 |
You’ll note that despite the early exit of the two Manchester clubs, England (for now) is leading in points this season. Not counting the points (maximum of 2) from the individual result from the tie over two legs, Arsenal’s likely exit before the quarters will cost the Premier League far less than they would if they hadn’t made the group stage or the second round: one point—the same point Italy lost last season when Tottenham beat AC Milan.
Even if England had performed terribly this season in the Champions League, a single season isn’t a good measure of the the Premier League’s decline. Take Portugal’s high points total from the 2010-11 season. Porto and Braga’s Europa League cup run gave them the highest point total that year, only to see it shrink somewhat this season. Individual factors were at play as they are for every team each year (read Jonathan Wilson’s take down of Porto’s supposed “tough run” in the competition last season), although the case will eventually made that Benfica’s and Porto’s CL and EL runs respectively show the league is steadily improving.
So, whither England? Perhaps Sacchi is correct and Serie A is benefiting on the back of an English decline. Yet there as equally plausible explanations. Earlier this year, Michael Cox wrote on this blog how the current goal glut in English football came about because the top sides were increasingly imitating Barcelona’s possession-based approach, yet without the adequate defensive personnel:
Chelsea’s struggles with a high line at the weekend were obvious, and in David Luiz they have a fine footballer who presently seems incapable of traditional defending. Barcelona’s passing out from the back means sides are increasingly looking for ball-playing centre-backs, arguably at the expense of defensive organisation. Luiz is the obvious example, but Jonny Evans has combined good distribution with poor positioning at times, and Laurent Koscielny, though excellent against Chelsea, has had to add bravery and strength to his ball-playing ability, rather than vice-versa.
In other words, the Premier League could be undergoing a tactical transition, and several of the Big Club back lines have yet to adapt. Chelsea’s problems are clearly defensive while United have been tinkering with their centreback pairing for months now. Manchester City have a good defensive record, along with Liverpool, but both have been profligate up front at times, the latter far too often.
All this is to say that a single season doesn’t tell the tale. Last year the Bundesliga were the darlings of Europe, and many had high hopes for Dortmund who ultimately crashed out at the group stage. This year there is a very faint case for Serie A. But there is no solid evidence that either league has suddenly made strides to compete with English dominance at the top. To know that for certain we need a few more years and the bigger sample size time entails.
Love how you answered the question right away.
1 match between 2 teams: 1 being a current league champions and 1 being a team in massive nosedive cannot determine if the EPL is in decline.
Sacchi, like most Italians, is upset at losing out the 4th CL spot to Germany and is clutching at straws to find reasons to bring other federations down. Frankly, it is embarrassing for him to be making such a statement based on one CL campaign.
Serie A’s decline happened over the years, soon after the whole match fixing scandal, it has been in decline. Look at the co-efficient, only year Italy had above 15 points was when Inter won the treble. Just last year, United was in the finals, what was the highest finishing Serie A team? Top 8 – with an Inter team getting embarrassed by an average Schalke team. Sure, Italian teams have improved this season, hard not to when you have such low benchmark. Just because A.C. Milan beat a very average Arsenal team doesn’t reflect on the whole association. There will be bad year once in awhile, Serie A has had a lot more than EPL and La Liga combined in recent years.
you really believe italian football is on a decline still? you realize platini counts europa league and cl as the same when calculating coefficients
Well, to say Italian football has been in decline since calciopoli (2006) wouldn’t be all that fair. 2006 Italy won the world cup. 2007 A.C Milan won the champions league. 2010 Inter Milan won the champions league. The only country who can compete is Spain. England have won nothing, and Germany REALLY haven’t won anything.
One horrible year does not mean that the EPL is in decline. All of the top English teams are going to come back stronger next year. City have learned a valuable lesson from their CL defeat, Chelsea and Arsenal will surely be rebuilding big this summer, and we’ve all seen Manchester United ability to bounce back after poor seasons.
Spain and Italy are still miles behind. Germany is the only league that is growing at a rapid rate and will be a force next year if they can hold onto their biggest stars; Gotze, Schurlle etc.
Stop knee jerking.
And this coming from a Serie A fan.
I agree with John. English teams will come back, but this year’s poor European (city, utd, and us with Chelsea still to come) showings can’t be ignored
yes it does. But these things happen.
How about the fact that AC Milan was fielding a weak line up? And Seedorf left the game a minute in! If you watched the whole game you know that 4 – 0 flattered Arsenal and it should have been a lot worse. It was shockingly one sided.
Taking the 4th spot away from Italy was B.S…
Italian teams could care less about Europa League and everyone knows it…
Well, then! A weak line-up you say? Guess that darn UEFA coefficient will have to be tossed out the window.
the coefficient has to be adjusted, europa league games have to count for less, it really is ridiculous that the bundesliga ( which is without a doubt a great league, top 3 after epl and serie a, above ligue 1, la liga, and the portuguese league) got the extra spot because of europa league performance
But that would equally affect Italy’s ranking. There’s really no fiddling with the numbers that favour’s Italy over Germany.
Richard, while I’m inclined to agree with your basic premise, for your sole piece of evidence to support your claim to be the UEFA coeff is ludicrous. As Joseph stated above, the equal weight given to EL in their formulations is insane. You honestly believe that the Portuguese league, who failed to have a single team in the knockout stages of CL, was the “strongest” league last year? I don’t believe so, but b/c their teams did so well in EL, there you have it.
Actually Portugal’s exceptional performance in the Europa League and its reflection in the coefficient is a brilliant example, if I do say so myself.
My point is that the final coefficient takes into account several seasons (the most recent five, to be exact), not just one in isolation. So the coefficient takes into account outliers. It’s the best means we have to determine which is the dominant league at any time. It works even if one domestic league either wildly underperforms or overperforms in a single season. If English clubs continue to crash out of the comp, then their ranking will slip. That’s exactly what happened with Italy.
Consider the windfall one domestic league receives with an added CL spot; also consider the relative paucity of association complaints on the coefficient system. Leagues don’t complain on the whole because this is a statistically fair means of determining which domestic league should be allotted the most places.
yeah seriously leave to a moron from the score to still not clear it up, serparate the champions league coeffiecny with europa league, then tell me what the true story is regarding champions leauge screw europa league
Normally best to a) try to spell b) make an attempt at punctuation and c) provide an actual counter argument before calling someone a moron. I think this rule is written down somewhere…
and no real resoponse just an insult, very professional
There’s nothing there to respond to, outside of you calling me a moron. Which I did respond to. When you have an argument to make, let me know.
sorry wth that being said i hate when journalist talk bout decline of leauges it kinda dumb
champions league winner by nations
spain 13
italy 12
england 11
germany 6
does that warrant more champions league spots at all
So leagues should be penalized with fewer CL spots for European Cup results from sixty years ago? Donny, you’re out of your element.
ok how many champions leagues champions have come from germany in the last 10 years?
One. The same number as Portugal :)
WTF!! in the last 10 years germany has 0.
Sour grapes Richard?