Real Madrid currently have won 14 CL titles, do you think in the next 50-60 years, any club could have overtaken them in the record or they’d continue to reign?
Their team is currently in transition, but with assembly of young stars like Vini, Rodrygo, Bellingham, Endrick, Camavinga, Tchouameni, Valverde, Militao, Guler and potentially Davies + Mbappe in 2024 may get them more CL wins in this decade alone!
Do you think any team can overtake them in most CLs won by our lifetime or is the gap too big to overcome?
It’s highly unlikely.
Madrid and Barcelona benefit from having a duopoly over the league. While occasionally a third or a fourth team will compete, Real Madrid knows they will usually finish first or second. This guarantees them Champions League football every season.
This guarantee, combined with their status in Spain and in world football allows them to attract some of the world’s best players. All it takes is some shrewd transfer dealings and some astute management and they will have a team capable of winning the champions league.
The lack of competition in their league also allows them to prioritise the Champions League should they wish, meaning they can rest their best players before each champions league match without affecting their final league position too much.
Even if Real Madrid fell on serious financial hard times, there’d be no shortage of middle eastern money interested in purchasing them.
you simply cannot purchase Madrid it is fan-owned club can’t sell cant buy
Lack of competition is relative, dude. They certainly have had more competition in the recent years than the likes of Bayern or PSG. Or Juventus in the past before they dropped their level. A duopoly already makes you focus in the domestic goal too the way these monopolistic clubs don’t have to face. There’s a minimum point threshold Barca forces you to make to win La Liga. And City has only have to face Liverpool 3 times and Arsenal once in the race for the lead, there’s not been any competition outside them. So even if the rival varies, that’s still a duopoly too, a two horse race. There’s an argument to include City among the easiest league winners too, as results show. The clásico race is more demanding because Barca is just a larger threat for Madrid’s interests domestically. So is Atletico than any other 3rd title contender in the Premier. Who is Atletico equivalent for the past City dominance? One could argue it’s Arsenal, but they’ve not won a single major competition with Arteta just yet. Atletico has already two leagues in the past 10 seasons.
Even though title race is not as easy as you may claim, it’s true they’ve almost got a guaranteed UCL spot among the top 4 which may be a little bit more difficult to get at EPL because of the Big 6, basically. But that’s not different here again than Bayern or PSG’s case. It’s more spread out among the top in La Liga than in these cases I’d say, just look at Real Sociedad or Athletic recent storming performances. Sum to that the recently successful too EL winners Sevilla and Villarreal (the solely exception for them both being this year of transition), and with the Big 3 you already have 7 sides there. One to drop from Europe every season, two if some extraordinary underdog runs like Girona’s happens. Not even counting fallen in disgrace big clubs like Valencia.
So they’ve consistently got to top 4 spots because of the Big 3 gap against the rest, that’s true. But it’s got to do more with RM’s own status than the rest of the league. RM would be massive at any other league too. That alone doesn’t explain Real’s consistency.
Bayern and PSG have a monopoly over their respective leagues. I feel this actually hinders them rather than helps them as, although they can prioritise the UCL, they don’t have a club in their league to give them a serious challenge season after season.
I am talking about winning the UCL though as opposed to winning the domestic league. You don’t need to win the league to get into the UCL, but I do agree that having a rival in that league keeps the team sharper as a whole.
Man City have done very well recently due to their massive financial power. Chelsea did the same at one point too. The difference is that clubs in the English league ebb and flow, just look at Man Utd now. Real Madrid have been in a similar position since the 1950’s. Real Madrid are closer to being a Bayern Munich than Man City is.
That’s a pretty weak argument when you look at it subjectively. Spain two (or three) top teams are amazing, but they can afford to rest players to ensure their best players are in top form for their biggest games. A lot of teams in England don’t have that luxury. We could argue that Man City have now reached a point where their squad is large enough to do that, but that squad depth is also what enabled them to win the UCL in the first place.
Overall Premier League teams are better than the Spanish league when taken as an average and that is why the league is harder.
What’s your point? So would Man United, Liverpool, Bayern Munich and PSG. I didn’t even mention Man City and Chelsea.
I don’t know why you’re trying to defend the Spanish league so much. Real Madrid is a great team with a great rival in a relatively weak league. This enables the two great teams in that league access to UCL football every season and ensures that they are likely to stay near the top of the food chain in world football forevermore.
I’d say that’s a pretty sweet position to be in as a Real Madrid fan.
I may be biased as a Cádiz fan but you’re just unfair here. Relatively to who? La Liga has been the best league from 2009 to 2018 probably. 2nd since then according to UEFA. So it’s a “relatively weak league” only compared to EPL. That’s not the definition of weak, nor a difference between Real Madrid and other European continental rivals the likes of Bayern, Dortmund, PSG, Juve, Ájax, Benfica, Nápoles, both Milan… who just happen to play on arguably weaker leagues.
If you say La Liga is weak, then I’ve got a claim for “RM being massive” everywhere. Because they’re THE largest club by most metrics. They’re just bigger than all clubs you mentioned. Hence this topic to start with.
This topic is about Real Madrid’s European rivals chances to catch them at UCL tally. Among their biggest traditional rivals figure AC Milan, Liverpool, Bayern or Ajax. Recent rivals including Juventus, Chelsea, City or PSG too.
So we’re talking about what differentiates Real from them. I’d say good management comes first. Some of these clubs have spent nearly as much, yet have not succeeded even a fraction. When Real spends, despite some notable exceptions to the rule (Hazard), they do it RIGHT. Ronaldo, Kroos, Modric, Vinicius, Valverde, Bellingham already have all proven that. Núñez at Liverpool, Messi and Neymar at PSG, not to talk about Juve or Chelsea… with many sounded big flops, they’re miles away as of today. Only side comparable among the big ones is City with a squad built around world’s best manager’s mentality and with a whole state funding behind. That comparison alone speaks volumes about Pérez success at managerial level. Not even Barca could capitalize from their recent successful era (talking about their 09-18 run, with 09-11 probably best club ever?) nearly as much. Last year UCL’s run even at their current transition period is the most direct example. No team manages that, not even City. They needed just the piece they lacked: a pure 9.
I agree success calls for success. That’s got to do more with both Real and Bayern historical success than City’s lack of capacities. We’re talking about current state of things though. La Liga is closer to the 3 horse race than the Bundesleague or even the Premier. You may seem to miss La Liga has been more contested in the last couple of years than the Premier. That’s an objective truth too. You seem to run from one perspective to the other conveniently. You can’t say EPL is better and more contested. The first was not true in the past decade and a half and the latest hasn’t been true recently. Man U is relevant historically but not as actual UCL contenders, truth be told. That would be Liverpool and more recently, Arsenal, even though the latest with Arteta have really achieved nothing just yet.
Nor do most La Liga sides apart from the Big 2. Even them lose points when not at full, just look at Barca’s most recent domestic match.
Btw, Atlético won that 13/14 season (and were therefore at their prime) just when RM came to win the next 3 UCL. They also won it the year prior Real Madrid won their latest UCL. Wouldn’t say domestic competition harms their European performances that much, it actually seems to work the other way around.
I don’t see how is that the case when you were attacking La Liga’s “duopoly” because of lack of competition even though, by definition, it’s a more contested scenario.
See, that’s a better argument. Competition level throughout the league more than about title contenders. But here again, works when compared to EPL. Wouldn’t say La Liga’s bottom is worse than Serie A’s, Bundesleague or specially Ligue 1 though: check their ELOs
Sevilla or Villarreal success at EL, yet struggling at domestic level is an indication.
Take in mind if you take out Barca and Real from the equation, you’ve got to do the same with Bundesleague (Bayern and Dortmund) and so on, to compare apples to apples.
That’s true, I was being unfair. The Spanish league is the second most competitive league amongst the top leagues.
Agreed, although Ajax is no longer part of the conversation and you left Man United and possibly Inter from the list.
I’d say the way the league is set up allows for Real Madrid to have success even with bad management. It’s easy to do it right when they buy the best players as per the galactic policy, however the status of Real Madrid is what makes that kind of policy sustainable in the first place.
We don’t know who will be top of the EPL, or the Italian League in 15 years time. We do know that Barcelona or Real Madrid will be top of the Spanish league and that Bayern will be top of the German league. Some other leagues have cycles and that is very relevant when discussing UCL wins.
It’s about having the right amount of competition. Athletes in most sports can only maintain their peak for a short time. The Spanish League has the perfect amount of competition (one, sometimes two teams) to remain sharp enough to play at the highest standard but to enable their players to peak for the important matches.
Teams in monolopy leagues can also enable their players to peak for the important matches, but the overall lack of competition in their league affects their sharpness (the pressure to win each match is lower).
Yes I was comparing to the EPL and not taking into account leagues in other teams. Although in fairness, part of the reason for that is because I believe that the EPL teams currently have the best chance of winning the UCL outside of the Spanish teams.
I think that may have to do more with Real, Barca and Bayern both institutional pull (as the hegemons they are) and consistency. Barca been failing a bit lately but they’re not going to turn into another AC Milan overnight. The reason for Serie A being more uncertain now is because Juve dropping the level, not the rest catching up. On the contrary City clearly raising the bar for EPL (both Liverpool and Arsenal would have been champions with their points given any other past season) and translating into European performances too, where Italians successors to AC Milan and Juve have just been poor. Uncertainty does not necessarily mean overall competitiveness. That’s why I think this argument here is misleading. Bayern, Real and Barsa also appear among anyone’s list on the UCL contenders for the next 15 years. Heck I’d even pick them in my top 5 along with probably City and maybe Liverpool. That shows not only domestic consistency but European’s, which means clubs’ consistency as a whole. It’s not the league’s fault at all.
Yeah, well I even left Barca because we were talking about possible La Liga advantages and I chose Real being the clear leaders in that sense. But Barca’s 5 UCL makes them closer than anyone imo than Bayern or Liverpool. They’ve been the most succesful side this century so far apart from Real themselves.
I just wanted to put some perspective there. La Liga is not a walk in the park, nor a walk in the park as you stated helps you precisely. See PSG, Benfica, Ajax nowadays
My argument is that their domestic consistency assists their European consistency. If Man City and Liverpool dominate the EPL for the next 20 years, they will be able to have consistency in Europe too. At the moment English teams do well in the ECL by virtue of being in the most competitive league. There have been four different English teams that have won the ECL in approx the last 20 years.
I did understate the quality of the Spanish league in relation to Europe and I shouldn’t have done that, although I still stand by my general points.
I still stand by my comments regarding clubs that have monopolies over their leagues, but I do accept that without big money being a monopoly doesn’t help a club in Europe (as per Ajax and Benfica), but also that big money alone doesn’t guarantee success (as per PSG. Although it would be a surprise if don’t they eventually win a UCL).
Scary to think of how strong the two top clubs must have been right?
The “lack of competition” teams (Sevilla, Athletico, Villarreal, Valencia) you are referring to also dominated Europa Cup the last 20 years.