Chelsea

For all their faults one thing I do believe in is that since Roman arrived with all his money and all the while Chelsea grew stronger and stronger (at one point looking they could dominate the league for years to come) its forced the other teams to improve a great amount just to compete with them.

It took Man United a couple of seasons to catch up and Arsenal a further season. Teams not only had to improve their first teams but greatly improve their squads as well. 80 points a Championship winning league total 5 - 10 years ago may now only get you 3rd for example.

From this its given English teams a great advantage when it comes to the Champions league. 2 semi finalists in 2005 (Liverpool went on to win), 2 semi finalists in 2006 (Arsenal made the final), 3 semi finalists in 2007 (Liverpool made the final) & already we look to have 4 teams through to the quarter finals. Our record before this period was very poor.

So not an appreaction thread but er, thanks Mr Ambromovich.

Oh yeah, cheers, thanks for taking that CL spot and turning the elite 3 into an elite 4. It's done wonders for the league. Swings and roundabouts Spanky.

Yep. Its pushed the league on to another level.

You now expect all four EPL teams in the CL to reach the last 16 of the CL, which is quite amazing really.

Hopefully by this time next week I'll be bumping the EPL domination thread as four of the last eight teams in the CL are EPL teams

Tweedle wrote:Yep. Its pushed the league on to another level.

You now expect all four EPL teams in the CL to reach the last 16 of the CL, which is quite amazing really.

Hopefully by this time next week I'll be bumping the EPL domination thread as four of the last eight teams in the CL are EPL teams

I'd still be happy with 3 only through and Liverpool out though.

here's to hiking up transfer prices so that promoted/poorer clubs can barely compete

here's to collecting players they don't want or need, just so no one else can have them

here's to ruining said players confidence to the extent that they end up at Newcastle

here's to Steve Sidwell, Scott Parker, Branislav Ivanović, Florent Malouda, Khalid Boulahrouz, Hernan Crespo, Adrily Schevchenko, Asier Del Horno, Adrian Mutu, Juan Sebastian Veron, Scott Parker, Alexei Smertin, Jiri Jarosik, Tiago

here's to proving that the Premiership can be bought

here's to Peter Kenyon

Lassana Diarra

Only 3 teams going to qualify for the CL soon anyway.

Glenn Hysén wrote:
here's to ruining said players confidence to the extent that they end up at Newcastle

It has made the EPL stronger, but that is by forcing other teams to look for more money and investment, eg Glazers, Hicks, Lerner etc.

EPL's record in Europe was poor some years ago not only because the EPL was weak, but mainly that the main representative, manu was poor. In contrast Lyon, PSV etc still do relatively well considering the relative weakness of their respective leagues.

Have you forgotten that Arsenal qualified for the CL in alot of those seasons in that period or do you just not know?

Parks lives wrote:Have you forgotten that Arsenal qualified for the CL in alot of those seasons in that period or do you just not know?

I said main representative as in other french, dutch teams etc have qualified but Lyon and PSV have usually done well, as compared to England's main representative of manu.

My point was well-made but a good effort nonetheless in trying to get out of it .

Ok it's made the Premiership stronger in the short term, but how has that come about - by clubs actively seeking similar sugar daddys, and rich billionaires who know nothing about football, now having open eyes and going in to buy Premiership clubs. Look at what's happening at Liverpool, and that could easily happen elsewhere.

And making it more difficult for teams to play their youth products and focus on buying them for money or poaching them at young ages ,yes job well done.

What it has done is given a very strong team to EPL though one who isnt on the fringes etc but probably is the team to beat at times ,much better competition for the title.

With regards to building on your young English players I think we've seen enough examples of what happens when players play too much football at too young an age. Also imo the competition for places is good and while every club should aim to develop young talent, it should not be at the expense of challenging for/winning competitions.

I really agree with this. When we dominated the premiership it became to easy and Fergie's idea of really making the team stronger was just two huge names to bring in. But since Chelsea he and Carlos have had to really have a big rethink and revamp the whole squad. And now it's probably the best squad we've ever had in terms of depth and ability.

We had years where he was happy to spend 20 mill on 4-5 players just to boost the squad and they were not great players. Now he only brings in great or potentially great players.

So Chelsea's money and Mourinho's winning record have helped in a way.

I was just thinking this the other day. In the past 75 points would win you the league. Now it would probably get you 3rd place.