Question from new member from California

Hello Barca Board!

I've been a Barca fan for a few years. I bought a Ronaldinho jersey at Camp Nou several years ago while visiting Europe. I have a question about La Liga and the recent Barcelona and Real Madrid dominance.

My understanding is that Barcelona and Real Madrid are the best two Spanish team right now. And because RM and Barca can afford to spend much more money, they have a substantial advantage over other La Liga teams. They can get better players. I believe the last 10 championships have been won by Barca or RM. In addition, the format for La Liga with no sudden-death playoffs, makes it more difficult for others to win. It seems like each year, if Real Madrid beats Barcelona (or vice versa) then they win La Liga.

Here's my question: does the winning La Liga seem less important than, Champions League or even Coppa del Rey, because there's one legitimate competitor?

In America, we have this problem in baseball, but the playoff format makes it less predictable. With American football and basketball, there's more parity because of a league-imposed salary cap.

Anyway, thanks for letting me join.

Hello and welcome!

Well Valencia won the league in 2002 and 2004 but since then only Barcelona and Real Madrid have won it. There's many reasons for it but the main reason is them being much more popular than any other team. I've heard people saying about 80% of the Spanish population support one of the big two as either their primary or secondary team, and even though it's most likely a more modest number most Spanish football fans side with one of the teams. They earn much more than any other team not only in match-day revenue (tickets, food, etc found at the stadiums) [Camp Nou and Santiago Bernabeu are by far the largest club stadiums in Spain, Betis stadium comes third with 55,000 seats] and merchandise but also from the TV-deals as clubs are paid based on how many watch their games.

Now to your question: Is the league worth less than both the CL and cup? No. I believe most people would say the CL is the most important (as it's against the best teams in the world) followed by the league and then the cup. The Europa League would probably be somewhere between league and cup.

http://counterattackingfootball.com/la-liga-tv-rights-is-there-any-hope-for-change/

http://counterattackingfootball.com/la-liga-tv-rights-is-there-any-hope-for-change-part-2/

http://counterattackingfootball.com/la-liga-tv-rights-is-there-any-hope-for-change-part-3/

If you have the time, heres a 3 part article on the state of la liga and why it's like that. Written by Michael Cerna (great writer btw, check him out if you feel like it)

Welcome Deco 20 did a v. good job of answering your questions IMO, to me winning La Liga is still quite important, in the least think of it on a rivalry level, being better than Madrid. I do wish there was more competition in the league (though there are still several decent-to-good La Liga clubs around) but hey. Definitely still more important than CdR.

Wow. Fascinating stuff. Thanks for the Cerna article. I think what complicates matters for La Liga is other competitive leagues in England, Italy, Germany, etc.

In the U.S., the NBA (National Basketball Association) has the same problem as La Liga. It negotiates national BUT not regional TV revenues. And that makes a *BIG* difference. The LA Lakers and NY Knicks have a huge basketball viewing market in LA and NY so they recently negotiated a very large TV contract with the local cable companies. Other teams, like Milwaukee or Charlotte, don't have the viewer base to support such a big contract.

How come the NBA doesn't have the same problem as La Liga? Then how come the NBA Finals aren't always between the LA Lakers and NY Knicks? Because the NBA owners collectively dumped the problem onto the players by imposing a salary cap. No NBA franchise can have an overall collective salary above X dollars. I think X is $60 million or so. But it changes yearly. And it's not important. While it's not perfect, it generally means Charlotte has a better chance of keeping star players than Seville or Villarreal have.

But you'll never be able to impose a salary cap in La Liga because they'll just defect to other leagues in Europe - EPL, Serie A, Bundesliga. Meanwhile, NBA players have nowhere else to go. European and Asian basketball pays its athletes far, far less than the NBA does.

I consider the league the main objective of every season, the cups are mainly bonuses. A great bonus in the case of the CL. As long as we're doing better than Madrid I'm satisfied.

composite said:

But you'll never be able to impose a salary cap in La Liga because they'll just defect to other leagues in Europe - EPL, Serie A, Bundesliga. Meanwhile, NBA players have nowhere else to go. European and Asian basketball pays its athletes far, far less than the NBA does.

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Exactly, and it's already happening due to the poor finances of most Spanish clubs (and Spain in general) forcing them to sell their stars cheaply and making it impossible for them to match the wages of the premier league.

An example of this is Canas' situation. He's a central midfielder for Real Betis who are currently 4:th in the league and have one of the largest fan bases in Spain. Despite this he'll most likely leave for the much smaller British club Swansea since they can pay him 3 times as much. His contract expires this summer.

Deco 20 said:

I consider the league the main objective of every season, the cups are mainly bonuses. A great bonus in the case of the CL. As long as we're doing better than Madrid I'm satisfied.


Exactly, and it's already happening due to the poor finances of most Spanish clubs (and Spain in general) forcing them to sell their stars cheaply and making it impossible for them to match the wages of the premier league.

An example of this is Canas' situation. He's a central midfielder for Real Betis who are currently 4:th in the league and have one of the largest fan bases in Spain. Despite this he'll most likely leave for the much smaller British club Swansea since they can pay him 3 times as much. His contract expires this summer.

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It sounds like La Liga has a huge dilemma. Part of the reason for their popularity is theri success internationally. IMO, the most popular leagues are EPL, La Liga, Serie A and Bundesliga. Because they're the most successful in Champions League competitions. But if you create more parity in La Liga, that'll weaken Barca and RM, and thus affect their chances of success on an international scale. I don't think La Liga can match the TV revenue in EPL.

But then how does Italian teams stay so competitive internationally? Two of the last 6 Champions League winners were Italian teams. It's hard to imagine Italy generating more TV revenue than Germany or even France?

Sorry if this has gotten way off-topic. But the economic side of European soccer and its competitive consequences are very fascinating.

This is actually a very interesting topic to discuss (in my opinion at least) haha. The revenue problem in la liga has really created a big gap in the big two. And the way modern day business works, the gap could grow even bigger or actually disappear completely. Right now Atletico is the first team that is vying to close the gap. They have an insanely talented squad (if you start to follow them more you can see the loads of talent they have). The problem with them competing with Barca and Real is maintaining squad depth so that their players don't get fatigued over the league campaign. However, they are only a few transfers and youth promotions away from achieving that depth. They have youth stars such as Javier Manquillo, Oliver Torres, and Saul Niguez ready to be brought up (and they really are potential stars). Plus they are going to transfer in players like Leo Baptistao, Piti, and i think Patrick Ebert (those players are really good but play for smaller teams). All this depth is essential so that they can start to challenge for the title within a few years. Plus the revenues they make from playing in the CL will make them much richer and allow them to pay off all the debt. They won the Europa league last year and still made like 7 million in revenues. Compare this to Man United who went out in the group stages of the CL and lost the Europa league who made 12 million. That's how much of a profit the revenues of the Champions league makes. Atletico are soon going to join Barca and Madrid at the top unless they sell major stars.

As for the rest of the league, Malaga is slowly rising (it will be at least 5 years before they are title challengers) and getting out of debt. The revenues from the CL this year will pay off any fees they still have and they might get the support back from their oil-rich owner. Next there is Valencia, Bilbao, and Sevilla who are going to get a slight improvement from the new La liga tv deal. This will be enough for them to rise slowly and steadily over the next few years. Other than that i don't think it's too necessary to have way too many title contenders (Even other leagues don't have more than like 4-5 at most)

Serie A is competitive domestically because most teams are naturally at the same level. However teams like Juventus are much higher than the rest of the league. There are also many teams such as Fiorentina, Lazio, and Napoli on the rise who are gaining funds. Milan and Roma are eventually going to go into renaissances and return to the top. Italian teams are competitive internationally because of short terms of extremely strong form. That's the reason Inter won the treble one year with their players doing much better than they usually would. Plus Mourinho's defensive cup tactics also played a part. Also, Milan won it in 07 because that was when they were still dominant. After that they sort of started to degrade over the years. Serie A was getting bad from 2006-2012 but now that Juve is back and teams are getting competitive again it is on the rise. The revenues in Italy are high because teams like Juve, Milan, or Inter bring popularity to the league. It's historically known as an elite league with lots of competition.

Bundesliga has high revenues because of the extremely loyal and passionate fan bases. They don't bring in much international fandom but the domestic fandom is un-rivaled in the entire world. EPL gets its funds because it is the most popular league domestically and internationally. This is because English is by far the most widely used language so it reaches a much wider audience than a league that speaks Spanish, German, French, or Italian. The domestic fanbase is large, but the international fanbase is HUGE just because of the language barrier. This is why the EPL is so rich and dominant in the media.