It may not be time to settle accounts yet – because it’s only the first half of the Round of 16 doubleheader – but the preliminary and strongest impressions of the second phase of the Champions League say unequivocally: in a season of historical investments and in the financial sense of an unprecedented gap between the Premier League and all other elite championships, English clubs and their results are, to say the least, a big disappointment.They finished the group part of the competition quite superior. Manchester City, Chelsea and Tottenham as group champions, Liverpool as second, with the same number of points as Napoli. Together, they registered 16 wins and only three defeats in 24 games… Under the impression of such a performance, and then also the winter transfer window – everyone saved money except for the English – many predicted the dominance of the Premier League members in the continuation of the elite competition, perhaps similar to that of two seasons ago (when Chelsea and Manchester City played in the final), but something completely opposite is happening.##NAJAVA_MECA_7041449##It started with Tottenham’s defeat at San Siro against AC Milan (0-1), continued with Chelsea’s fall at Westfalen in a clash with Borussia Dortmund (0-1), and Liverpool’s debacle against Real at Anfield (2-5) completed the downfall of the teams which participate in the most popular leagues today.Manchester City somewhat pulled it off by drawing 1-1 in Saxony against RB Leipzig, but honestly, that’s little consolation. Especially if you consider how that match unfolded and also – translated into points, English teams won one out of a possible twelve?!Furthermore, if the defeat of Tottenham against a sleeping giant like Milan on its field is possible to “digest” (it is an active result), or if the unsurpassed greatness of the Royal Club and the indestructibility of this generation can justify for Liverpool’s ordeal, for the failures of Chelsea and City it is difficult to find an explanation. First of all, because they happened in clashes with German clubs.Neither the quality nor the good form of Dortmund and Leipzig should be ignored (in the case of the former, a great atmosphere at the stadium), but it is difficult to escape the impression that these are teams that are far from the very top of Europe. Also, especially expressed in these two cases, we are dealing with clubs that have profiled themselves as developing and they mainly supply clubs like Manchester City or Chelsea with new players.Their best goods have ended up in the Premier League in recent years. And that should further depress the English: they take the best of them and then fail to beat them again.Nervous Guardiola: How many Leipzig matches have you watched? Maybe I’ll go crazy in the second leg and play with nine strikers!Of course, all this could take on a different dimension after the return games, all Premier League players except Liverpool have an active score, but until then – these are the facts.Well, speaking of facts, here’s another rather painful one for the Islanders: four of their representatives in the round of 16 of the Champions League together spent an incredible 1,077,000,000 euros on reinforcements this season. More than a BILLION euros for a single draw after the first matches of the round of 16 of the Champions League?!Then they get angry when guys like Uli Hoennes or Karl Heinz Rummenigge mock them and repeat that the English are doing terrible business…True, a look at the finalists of the Champions League in the last five years reveals that only one season did not find an English club in the fight for the trophy. However – is that enough? Are two European titles in the last ten years commensurate with the amount of invested funds? Or were they not supposed to leave the thorne during all that time?Which #EPL teams will qualify to the next stage of the #UEFA_Champions_League . @ChampionsLeague @premierleague 1. @SpursOfficial 2. @ChelseaFC 3. @LFC 4. @ManCity pic.twitter.com/tbT6ONZZJa— jericho 🇬🇭 (@YngJericho) February 23, 2023
