Why La Liga is the most balanced league in Europe
Last Sunday’s comeback by Sevilla to shock first-place Real Madrid and end its historic run of 40 matches unbeaten was just the latest example of why La Liga offers the most intriguing, competitive and balanced domestic league in Europe.
And, yes, that includes the Premier League.
Zinedine Zidane and his men still sit one point clear at the top with a game in hand, but Spain is no longer a two-horse or even a three-horse race. Sevilla, a team built on dominating at the Estadio Ramon Sanchez Pizjuan, has won eight of nine matches and collected more points at home than any other club in the league. With new coach Jorge Sampaoli, who led Chile to its first-ever Copa America title in 2015, the side from the south of Spain is no longer content to being defined by Europa League glory, advancing to the round of 16 of the Champions League. Based on the current campaign, Los Rojiblancos should be favored to beat Leicester City and advance to the final eight in Europe.
Only one point behind Sevilla, Barcelona continues to sit in the long grass waiting to pounce when its prey experiences an unexpected stumble. If Real Madrid drops points against Real Sociedad in a couple of weeks and Sevilla drops points away to either Osasuna or Espanyol before the end of January, Barcelona can go top of La Liga in the blink of an eye with two victories to end the first month of 2017. Incredibly, even after Real Madrid went unbeaten from the end of February 2016 to the middle of January 2017, Barca – with Lionel Messi, in particular, looking hungry and motivated at the start of the new year – is only two points behind its biggest rival.
Meanwhile in England, Chelsea sits on a seven-point cushion over its closest opponent in the domestic league. But unlike La Liga, where the race for the final Champions League berth is far less predictable, the Premier League has a major drop-off from the top six to the rest of the pack. Even after Everton smashed Manchester City last weekend, the Toffees are seven points back of the top six and not considered a genuine threat to even capture a Europa League berth.
In Spain, however, Atletico Madrid currently occupies the final Champions League spot and sits only two points ahead of Real Sociedad, while a resurgent Villarreal is only one point behind Sociedad in sixth place. This is where La Liga really differs from the Premiership. Basque country’s most famous club, Athletic Bilbao, is hot on the trail and only three points away from Villarreal, but Athletic also has seven teams within seven points of it.
To illustrate the mobility factor of a team on the fringes of the top in England versus one in Spain, Athletic Bilbao gaining six points would go from seventh place into a tie for fourth and into a Champions League spot. Seventh-place Everton gaining six points would remain in seventh. Conversely, Bilbao removing six points would put the Basque club in a tie for 11th place. Everton magically losing six points would only drop the Merseyside club one position and into a tie for eighth place.
La Liga is a curiously well-balanced league at the halfway point in the season. From No. 1 Real Madrid sitting on 40 points to No. 20 Osasuna sitting on nine points, no team trails the team above it in the table by more than four points. Upward and downward mobility is possible at every level of the league. Italy also offers an intriguing title race in which the top six are only separated by nine points, but the quality in La Liga is undeniably better than Serie A. It’s not even close.
The Premier League’s spending power generates the argument that it is the best league on the planet and a narrative that any team can earn a surprise result because of the quality at the bottom. But it should be pointed out that one of Sevilla’s three league defeats came against second-from-the-bottom Granada and one of Sevilla’s three draws came against third-from-bottom Sporting Gijon. Likewise, newly-promoted Alaves is one of only two teams to claim a victory over Barcelona in the current season (Celta Vigo being the other).
As results have displayed, the top teams in La Liga can be shocked by the lower-level teams. Parity exists in Spain, as it does in England, if not more so. All three of Chelsea’s defeats have come against teams in the top four: Liverpool, Arsenal and Tottenham. Similarly, second-place Spurs has only suffered defeats against sixth-place Manchester United and clear title favorite Chelsea. Sure, Liverpool’s two defeats came against Bournemouth and Burnley, but both of those clubs occupy mid-table positions.
The bottom of the Premier League is not exactly smashing teams at the top, even if it has the power to spend bigger than the bottom of La Liga. And in terms of quality, Spain has been ahead of every league in Europe for several years, evidenced by the fact that Spanish sides have won the Champions League and Europa League in each of the previous three seasons. In fact, the Champions League final has only featured one non-Spanish team over the past three years.
In addition, the top four Spanish teams in the table at the midway point have also all qualified for the knockout rounds of the Champions League. No other country has four sides in the round of 16, and only one of England’s current top four is in the Champions League’s last 16. While Premier League defenders will point to the holiday fixtures to explain the drop-off, the Champions League group stage ended in early December, when all the leagues had been going full throttle at about the same pace.
After 16 rounds of the Premier League, which wrapped up play in the week after the Champions League group stages, Arsenal sat in third place as the top English club qualifying for the round of 16. Currently, none of the three Premier League sides to qualify for the Champions League knockout rounds sit in the top three in England. Pointing to the Champions League as an excuse, defending Premier League champion Leicester City is currently in 15th place domestically and still not free and clear of the relegation battle. Second-place Tottenham crashed and burned into the Europa League.
In Europe, Spain continues to convincingly win the argument over the Premier League.
While the Premiership may be a more popular league from top to bottom, La Liga offers far more competition and mobility from the middle to the top. At the top, Spain features a fiercer battle to go along with the best skills and brightest talents in the sport. Paul Pogba may have his own hashtag emoji on Twitter, but La Liga still has the top two talents in the sport: Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo.
For a change, though, La Liga seems to be deeper and narrower than ever before, making it less about Barcelona and Real Madrid and more about all the rest. While its finances may still be far from fair, the Spanish top flight is currently the most balanced domestic league in all of Europe.
