Chapter 34: The Europa League That Ended (Part II)

In the final analysis, the reason why small and medium-sized clubs are so active in the transfer market can be said to be related to the signing of sky-high contracts in the Premier League.

The Premier League's new TV contracts will come into effect this season, and the 20 Premier League teams will receive £2.7 billion for three consecutive years, £900 million a year, a 60% increase from the original. The Premier League's broadcast costs are among the highest in European leagues, with the second-placed Ligue 1 totalling just €600 million. Although Manchester United and Chelsea cannot compare with Real Madrid and AC Milan in this income, the distribution of the Premier League makes the small clubs much more nourishing than the disadvantaged groups in La Liga and Serie A.

The current Premier League televising fee is split between three parts: half is paid to the 20 clubs equally, a quarter is based on league standings and the other quarter is based on the number of TV appearances. As a result, although the top team still gets twice as much money as the relegated team, even a relegated bottom team like Derby County can still earn more than £1,000 in broadcast fee income. And even if it is relegated, the Premier League also has a parachute system, so that the relegated team still has a chance to turn over.

La Liga and Serie A are still separate clubs negotiating TV contracts, making it increasingly difficult for small and medium-sized clubs to be financially difficult. Sevilla also suffered last season due to the collapse of broadcasting contract negotiations, and there were no live broadcasts for several rounds of matches, which inevitably caused the club to lose a lot of money financially.

Teams outside the top three in Serie A receive equally little from broadcast fees. Milan, Inter and Juventus have a monopoly on television broadcasting, and they negotiate lucrative contracts with the broadcasters individually, while the remaining poor teams are at a disadvantage in negotiations, and their meager income is difficult to keep up with the team's expenses, so they have to sell players to survive. Even in Ligue 1, Lyon have a budget gap of up to seven times more than Ajaccio '05.

Of course, you can't talk about the Premier League without mentioning the Red Devils, the strongest team I've ever been in charge. Ferguson has nagged about such topics more than once this season.

Indeed, this generation of Manchester United players is maturing, successfully defending their Premier League title and winning their third amphora in the club's history after last season's setbacks in Europe. This also makes Ferguson's mouth of the strongest in history not as simple as words, as we all know, a real dynasty needs strong strength and glory to show the glory of the support, from all aspects, now this Manchester United team has more or less reached such a peak height.

Since the first year of the Premier League in 92, in the sixteen years since Ferguson moved to the Red Devils, Manchester United has won three two consecutive titles, one triple crown, in addition to 10 championships, there are 3 runners-up, 3 third places, 16 years The Premier League has never fallen out of the top three in the standings, you can imagine how terrifying this is a kind of power.

On the other hand, the other so-called Premier League titles, which have only won about half as many titles as the Red Devils, Arsene Wenger may be a rival for Ferguson, but Arsenal are far behind Manchester United, and the 10-3 ratio of titles speaks for itself.

Chelsea, the Blues of the two-game era and Jose Mourinho can certainly pose a threat to the current Manchester United, but now that the magic bird has returned, the branch of the Cherski is perched with another "special" guy, an Israeli Jew who has covered up the weakness of the whole season with only two wins. As for Blackburn, who stole a trophy, they were not competitive at all, and the 1994-95 season was just a minor episode in the 16-year Premier League in the eyes of many people.

As for Liverpool, who claim to be the Red Devils' eternal rival, they have not tasted a title in 18 years, and their own record of 18 top flight kings also smells of danger, and Ferguson defied "Liverpool's record will be broken sooner or later" when he beat Wigan to celebrate Manchester United's 17th top flight victory.

Looking at Europe, Manchester United's results are unbeatable. Bayern Munich are the only top-flight giants to compete with Manchester United on this point, having won 10 league titles since 1990, but the decline of the Bundesliga is a fact, and the latter titles are much less valuable.

Real Madrid have just won the 31st La Liga title in the club's history, but this is the first time in 18 years that the Galacticos have defended the title, with six titles in 18 years and 10 titles in 16 years. Serie A's Juventus and AC Milan have a glorious history of winning five league titles each in 10 years, but Old Lady's last 10 titles have been won in the last 28 years, while AC Milan has taken nearly half a century.

Ligue 1 is dominated by Lyon, and Aolas's team is in sight for seven consecutive titles, but in terms of heritage and league status, the Ligue 1 hegemon and Manchester United are obviously not at the same level.

Looking back at Serie A, there is no danger, Inter Milan completed the Serie A three consecutive championships. The league competition is getting hotter? As Totti puts it: "No, the scramble never began. By the 23rd round, Inter Milan had a 11-point lead over second-placed Roma, and the advantage was as obvious as last season's unrepeatable magic Inter.

The tension in the final stages of the league stemmed from Inter's own power outage, not how much pressure the opposition really put on the Nerazzurri. At the start of the season, Serie A experts generally agreed that it would be a highly competitive season: Roma were steadily improving, and both squads had the quality to challenge Inter Milan; AC Milan started the competition with Inter Milan with a deuce with the power of the European champions; Juventus came back from hell and playing on a single line is the Bianconeri's greatest advantage...... However, all the challengers who had high hopes were disappointed.

Last season's league runners-up and cup winners Roma are considered the team most challenging for Inter Milan's qualifications, and the Italian Super Cup triumph ahead of the season has given people more reverie. However, after three consecutive wins in the opening stages of the season, Roma's strange fortune quickly withered, winning only one of five consecutive league games, and even losing 4-1 in a direct confrontation with Inter Milan, which is doomed to defeat from then on.

After that, although Rome tried to catch up, it always had no choice but to capsize in the gutter and miss the opportunity. Zaccheroni said: "The biggest problem for Roma is that they don't focus enough, they always lose concentration against small teams, which makes them lose a lot of points, which is fatal. "The data is clear, against the upper teams (the top six), Roma have 7 wins, 3 draws and 2 losses, and the results are even better than Inter Milan's 5 wins, 5 draws and 2 losses; However, against the lower teams, Roma only won 7 and drew 6, while Inter Milan won 11 and drew 2, which is far better than Roma, which is the basis of the difference between Inter Milan and Roma.

As for the Rossoneri, last season's Champions League title was more of an emperor's new coat for AC Milan. AC Milan are clearly outdated in terms of quality, but they have relied on the explosion of superstars in a short period of time to indulge in the dream of the best team in Europe, which has hurt the Rossoneri this season. The lack of reinforcements in the summer has already determined the failure of AC Milan this season, and the Rossoneri have been in a series of ugly places at the start of the season, not only for San Siro for half a year, but even for a series of worst records since the 81/82 season, when AC Milan were relegated.

In the second half of the season, AC Milan once recovered, and the club was ruthless to put high hopes on Santo Tiago, which has now become the biggest cancer, on the bench, but all this was to no avail.

After just a few rounds, AC Milan fell back into a slump due to injuries and fatigue, and even with an eight-point penalty last season, the Rossoneri were not as embarrassed as they are today. It's ironic that even Champions League qualification has been a huge success for AC Milan so far. Thankfully, at the last minute, the Rossoneri took their fate in control of the Milan derby, while defending their honour and dignity and keeping the city from becoming an exclusive camp for the Nerazzurri.

There is also Juventus, who is back with Hu Hansan, one of the most consistent teams this season, this traditional giant has never left the first group even if it participates in the league as a promoted horse. Juventus are in the top three in all rankings in terms of overall results, home record, away record, record against upstream teams, record against lower teams, goals scored and goals conceded, and the second half of the triumph against Roma, Inter Milan and AC Milan showed the strength of this iron army.

However, Juventus have never been contenders for the league title, although they invested heavily last summer, but the recruitment effect was not good, several big money did not play the expected effect, the reason why the Bianconeri can stay at the top of the table is still Piero, Camoranesi, Trezeguet and Buffon and other old Juventus veterans are relentless.

In the second half of the season, Juventus's advantage in single-line combat began to be reflected, and the more physical Bianconeri had the upper hand in several strong conversations, but compared with the fact that Juventus did not win against strong teams in the first half of the season, it is more important that Juventus is not dragged down by European competitions.

It must be admitted that this Juventus team is the biggest highlight of Serie A this season, and what is even more commendable is that the year of second division purgatory has not worn out Juventus's innate kingly spirit, and Juventus is still the most effective Italian team in key battles.