Twenty years on the top flight has turned many former big hitters into small-town clubs
Every time the hype and anticipation surrounding Spain’s El Clásico series of grudge matches starts up in earnest, as it did last week for Barcelona’s 2–1 Copa del Rey defeat of Real Madrid, it is remarked rather smugly in this country that at least the Premier League can boast more than two teams capable of winning the title.
That is still just about true, though by common consent – Roberto Mancini, Sir Alex Ferguson, André Villas-Boas and a few others – the number presently stands at three. Viz, the two Manchester sides and Tottenham Hotspur, and even that number may reduce should City open up an eight-point gap over Spurs on Sunday afternoon. The rest of the chasers are already looking at an even bigger chasm to bridge, and as the Manchester United manager said last weekend it would take a collapse by all three teams at the top of the table to give Chelsea and Arsenal a glimmer of hope.
Three teams is only slightly better than two, though what the Premier League can rejoice in and La Liga cannot is that two of those three names are new. Manchester City have not won a league title since 1968, have had 22 managers since Joe Mercer, have been all the way to the third tier of English football and back and were everyone’s favourite joke club until three or four years ago. Spurs have never quite gone in for comedy to the same extent but you could have raised a laugh just a few seasons ago with the notion that they would be leading London’s challenge for the title with Chelsea and Arsenal floundering in their wake.
So the argument that the Premier League is more competitive than La Liga is not without merit, particularly as Arsenal and Chelsea are still in the Champions League and are still capable of mounting a convincing domestic challenge most seasons, and not forgetting it is less than a month since the bottom-placed team rather grandly prevented United ascending to the top of the table by beating them 3-2 at Old Trafford. There is more to English football than a rivalry between two teams, as is the rather unhealthy case in Spain, though increasingly the Premier League is becoming a tale of two cities.
Consider the facts. In the 20 years of its history, the Premier League has been won only once by a team from outside London or Manchester, and unless Liverpool or Newcastle are going to be absolutely amazing in the coming months, this season will conform to the usual pattern. The only exception to the rule, Blackburn under Jack Walker and Kenny Dalglish, was 18 years ago and acknowledged even at the time to be a one-off, never to be repeated achievement. In the first year of the Premier League Aston Villa were runners-up and Norwich finished third. The next few years saw Blackburn, Newcastle, Nottingham Forest and Leeds claim what might be termed podium finishes, though since the turn of the century the London-Manchester duopoly has tightened its grip. Only Liverpool, runners-up twice and in third place three times, have managed to get a look-in at the top in the past 11 years, apart from Newcastle, who managed third place in 2003. That means, of 33 possible podium places, only six have ended up outside London or Manchester since the 2000-01 season.
Liverpool and Newcastle, as it happens, are still the likeliest challengers to the duopoly, though not so likely that London or Manchester need be worried. At least not the leading teams in London and Manchester. Arsenal and Chelsea will be well aware that fourth place is still up for grabs, and Liverpool supporters in particular confident that once a toehold in Europe has been gained it can be used as a springboard to much greater glory. But as things stand Dalglish has yet to reverse the slow decline that has been his club’s story since they won their last title 22 years ago, and Newcastle have still to prove they can match the standards set under Kevin Keegan and Bobby Robson.
Elsewhere, however, the wastage is even worse. Everton and Leeds, among the last winners of the old First Division title, have slipped well out of contention. Leeds, like Nottingham Forest, have even slipped the odd division. Aston Villa have more in common with Midlands neighbours Wolves and West Brom in fearing relegation more than aspiring to achievement, three Lancashire clubs could easily be relegated – not that Blackburn, Bolton or Wigan have been doing much of late at the other end of the table – and although a certain level of success can presently be claimed at Stoke, Sunderland, Norwich and Swansea it is on a regional rather than national scale. That is not to denigrate the considerable achievements of Tony Pulis, Martin O’Neill, Paul Lambert and Brendan Rodgers, just to point out that it will be a while before they are acclaimed outside the Premier League.
abroad used to be that England was a country with an astonishing number of professional clubs and an incredible depth to its league system. That largely remains the case, though it is being obscured by the view that London and Manchester are synonymous with English success. The rest of the world can just about grasp that London, as a major capital and population centre, can contain a bewildering number of professional teams, though Spurs joining Arsenal and Chelsea in the Champions League bracket gives it an unusual potency. Manchester is a provincial city – that’s why both its teams carry its name – and although United’s unparalleled success in the last couple of decades has been the single biggest factor in shutting out the rest of the country, City’s wealth now seems likely to continue the process.
For how long is anyone’s guess, but the predictions made at the beginning of the Premier League, that it would eventually work against small-town teams and favour big clubs from big cities, appear to be coming true. It is just that 20 years ago no one had Liverpool and Birmingham or Newcastle, Sheffield and Leeds down as small towns. And no one imagined the number of big cities would be just two.
This afternoon’s big matches – City v Spurs, Arsenal v United – would have been pretty big at most points in the game’s history. London v Manchester has always been a rivalry within the overall context of English football, but where it used to be a subplot, it is now the whole story. It is true that more teams are involved in England, and there is comfort in that, but the situation is not so far removed from Spain that the Premier League can afford to feel smugness or superiority.
Manchester CityManchester UnitedArsenalTottenham HotspurChelseaPremier League 2011-12Premier LeaguePaul Wilson
guardian.co.uk
