EURO TITLE RACES ALREADY SEWN UP... BY THE USUAL RICH SUSPECTS
NO ONE suggested the wheels were coming off, but there was still some sort of inquest into Manchester City only managing a draw at St Mary’s last weekend.
And why not? After all, that means Pep Guardiola’s (below) team have now taken a mere 37 points out of a possible 39 since the beginning of November. It is a crisis. Only joking, of course, but it is a measure of the numbers put up by City under Pep that two points dropped at Southampton can cause some consternation.
Liverpool will do their best to match or beat those numbers, just as they did in their title-winning season of 2019-20 and just as they narrowly failed to do in 2018-19, amassing 97 points, but still falling one short of City.
The very good Premier
League teams, namely City and Liverpool, are getting better.
They probably will not amass 195 points between them – as they did in that 2018-19 campaign – but they won’t be far off.
But while we can all see the vague possibility of a meaningful title race, City are still 1/10 favourites with the bookmakers. Bet a tenner to win a quid (plus your stake back, obviously). Think that’s short? Try the odds on PSG winning the Ligue Un title... 1/250.
Over in Spain, Real Madrid are a City-style 1/10 to win La Liga and, in Germany, Bayern Munich are 1/50 to win the Bundesliga.
The most generously priced favourite for one of the major domestic leagues are Inter, at 1/5 for Serie A honours.
In other words, the domestic football leagues around Europe are barely into the second half of their seasons and there are
certainties everywhere you look. And there is a common denominator, of course.
They all, in one way or another, have a good few quid to spend.
You might say that has always been the case, but it is hard to believe it has ever been this pronounced.
If City justify their odds of 1/10, it will be their fourth Premier League title in five seasons.
Even now, it would be a brave man or woman who would back against them winning the 2022-23 edition.
The predictability of Europe’s top leagues does not appear to have diminished football’s popularity.
But that is surely not something that can be taken for granted.
Financial Fair Play was supposed to make the playing field a touch more level, but that appears to have pretty much been shelved. Or it appears to have been unfit for purpose.
As we will see over the next couple of days, the different degrees of monetary outlay make an oddly compelling narrative in club football.
And when it does happen, it is great to see a financial powerhouse fail and a financial underdog succeed.
But it seems like it is going to happen less and less.
Club football has long resisted economic restrictions such as salary caps and limits on transfer spending. And it will continue to do so. Fine. But if you are after a title race that involves anyone outside the usual rich suspects – if you fancy another Leicester City – you will be waiting a very, very long time.