adminTHERE was a time, in the not too distant past, when English clubs feared only each other in the later stages of the Champions League. Such was the dominance of Manchester United, Arsenal, Chelsea and Liverpool that one or the other reached seven out of eight Champions League finals between 2005 and 2012 and they claimed nine out of the 12 available semi-final places between 2007 and 2009.
How times change.
As the group stages of Europe’s premier club competition get under way on Tuesday, English clubs find themselves fighting to re-establish themselves at the top table.
Over the past three seasons, England has provided just three quarter-finalists — Chelsea twice and United once — although Chelsea did win the trophy in 2011-12. This deterioration must be seen in the context of advances elsewhere.
The jaw-dropping heights Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo have scaled for Barcelona (champions in 2009 and 2011) and current holders Real Madrid are part of a golden period for Spanish football.
It was the era of tiki-taka, of possession-based football, that not only saw Spain win Euro 2008 and 2012 as well as the World Cup in 2010, but the Barca of Andres Iniesta and Xavi mesmerise Europe. As former Manchester United boss Sir Alex Ferguson remarked after his team were beaten 3-1 by Barcelona in the 2011 final: “Great teams do go in cycles and they’re at the peak of the cycle they’re in at the moment.”
The same could be said of Bayern Munich, who reached three finals in four years, eventually winning in 2013.
They possessed a generation of gifted and technically-able German players, many of whom played their part in their national team’s World Cup triumph earlier this summer — Bastian Schweinsteiger, Thomas Muller and Mario Gotze among them. Here are also economic arguments. During the period in question, the weakening of the pound against the euro and the introduction, in April 2010, of a 50 percent tax band meant the cost of paying an overseas player a vast wage rose dramatically.
There was the spectre of financial fair play and the need to balance the books — and, even though Manchester City and Chelsea have vast wealth, they were not signing global superstars.
Yaya Toure and Sergio Aguero joined City, while Chelsea paid £50m for Fernando Torres. Big-name players certainly, but in Spain Real spent £80m on Ronaldo and £60m on Kaka, while Barcelona spent heavily to bring Neymar to the club.
Another factor is that for much of the past four years England’s biggest clubs have been in varying states of transition.
Liverpool, such a force in Europe for a period under Rafael Benitez, have taken time to recover from the Tom Hicks-George Gillett regime. Benitez led Liverpool to Champions League glory in 2005 and took them back to the final in 2007, but the borrowing of the American owners finally took its toll as the banks called in debts and forced a protracted sale that damaged the club on and off the field.
United also had debts to service, with the Glazer regime having borrowed the money to buy the club in 2005, and, while the brilliance of Ferguson’s managerial mind kept the club on track domestically, he was never allowed to recruit the kind of global star that might have helped United rebuild after the sale of Ronaldo in 2009. United have not won the competition since 2008, although they reached the final in 2009 and 2011.
Arsenal entered a period of austerity following their move to the Emirates in 2006, while the high-profile sales of Robin Van Persie and Cesc Fabregas hardly improved their prospects. — BBC.
Online Reporter