Is the premiership getting worse standard wise ?
 

The reason i ask this is because their are hardly any games this season that ive watched that have blew me away standard wise, Chelsea the current leaders have been pretty average at times this year, they should have blew away an injury hit Everton sideto kingdom come, Man United are similar.

If you picked a world 11 right now many premiership players would get in, i would say none at all. Torres is the closest but he has become injury prone, at his best he is one of the best strikers in the world but his best form was before his injury problems.

We have 3 english teams in the champions league and you would have to say it gives an english side a good chance of winning, i don`t think the winners will come from over here, Barcelona last year made United look fairly average especially in midfield and that was a far stronger United side that contained the likes of Tevez and Ronaldo.

A lot of experts have said for a while that the premiership is the best league in the world, it may have the most money available to sign and pay players big contracts but i wouldn`t say that we have the best teams in the world right now. The United squad in my opinion looks average, take away Rooney, Valencia and Evre and you don`t have a great deal left, Chelsea have some quality players but they also have some overrated ones as well combined with a few average players.

Its just my opinion but i don`t think our league at present is as good as some experts think it is.

Spain has the better top players but I'd say the Prem overall is stronger in terms of the teams in it. I agree though the standard has dropped but I think that's the case all over the world. I think there's a lack of real top talent currently the 10 world best excluded.

Could it not be that the rest of the prem teams are catching up with the "big four" and the quality gap between the teams is not so vast?

the rest of the premiership are definitly catching up with liverpool any way there gone downhill alot.

Personally i think its a case of the top 4 have either stayed stagnant and not strengthened or they have weakened their squads significantly, Man United have one of their worse squads during the last 10 years after letting Ronaldo and Tevez leave and not replacing them with genuine world class players.

Chelsea have stayed stagnant, they had a chance to improve their squad significantly in the summer but they havn`t brought in a player of any note, its basically last years squad that is a combination of some quality players, some overrated players and some average players.

Liverpool have weakened with Alonso leaving as he was instrumental to them, Arsenal never seem to bring in anyone significant apart from Arshavin, apart from the odd class player they just don`t have the strength in depth and they seem to have stayed stagnant as well as they are their usual inconsistent selves, brilliant one week and poor the next.

A lot of the so called weaker sides have improved player wise but i wouldn`t say they have closed the gap quality wise, like i said United have one of the worse squads in the lst 10 years and Chelsea rely on the usual culprits as do Arsenal, if their key players don`t turn up then their is not a lot after that quality wise.

What do you mean stagnant? :wonder:

They are "teams." You only get a group of players playing as a team if they know each others game. I personally prefer it that Chelsea have players that have been there along time.
Are you saying clubs should chop and change players every transfer window? because that's not the way to go.

It does seem this season all clubs can be beaten, makes it more interesting? hate it myself though! :D

United's 'squad' is as strong as ever. they have cover for all positions but just they have a ridiculous number of injuries in defence at the min. They don't have the same strength first XI as previous seasons I'll agree on that.

Chelsea are very strong all over and they didn't really need to bring anybody in for this season. Their problems lie a couple of years from now when they will need to replace all the ageing stars. Maybe they saw the work Carlo did at AC with a group of 40 somethings ;)

Liverpool overachieved last season. I said it at the start of this year it would be almost impossible to repeat the season they had and it's being proved correct.

Arsenal will always be a nearly team until they get some players in who have been there and done it.

The FIFA World XI announced yesterday says different . . .

Iker Casillas (Real Madrid)
Dani Alves (Barcelona)
John Terry (Chelsea)
Nemanja Vidic (Manchester United)
Patrice Evra (Manchester United)
Xavi (Barcelona)
Andres Iniesta (Barcelona)
Steven Gerrard (Liverpool)
Lionel Messi (Barcelona)
Cristiano Ronaldo (Real Madrid)
Fernando Torres (Liverpool)

Well that list is a load of bollox, John Terry's on it:wonder:




:D

Isn`t that based on last years form ? I`m certain i said that if a world team was picked right now based on current form then no player from the premiership would get in.

John Terry is overrated and shouldn`t get anywhere near a world team, Chelsea`s defence in recent times is hardly a solid foundation. Gerrard and Torres have been injured for decent spells this year so it can`t have been picked on current form, Vidic isn`t the same player that first arrived at United, the red cards are on the increase mainly due to his lack of pace where players have turned him and he has then rugby tackled them due to not having the speed to go with them. Evra is fair enough on last years form, not on this years form though.

:hjtwofing

No, not entirely. 'Over 50,000 professional footballers from around the world voting for their best starting XI of the last 12 months'

John Terry voted Drogba as the best player in the world last year and Ballack as the 2nd best. He really is a clueless classless **** and I hate the fact he's England captain.

:Whatever_ Obviously everybody should've voted for a Man USA player

Err No. You seriously telling me that Drogba and Ballack were better then Messi, Iniesta, Xavi this year?

Take the blinkers off Paul ;)

Over 50,000 professional footballers will have hardly seen Torres on the pitch this year as he`s spent the majority of the season sat in the stand, Gerrard has missed a fair bit of this season as well so the world X1 team that was posted above was obviously based on last years form, this season is approx 4 months old, what has Torres, Gerrard, Terry, Vidic and Evra done in the last 4months to warrant inclusion in a world X1 ?

My original point which was, if you picked a world X1 based on this seasons form then no premiership player would be worthy of a place, last years form has nothing to do with the point i made at the top. The point was about now, not what someone did or didn`t do last season.

Yeah, of course they are :lol1:

I'll have whatever Xmas tipple you're having! :D:thumb:

Drogba did get the second most votes from the international coaches and captains, so you must've started on the hard stuff already ;)