Chat S--- Get Banged: Leicester Have Won the League!
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I'm loving every minute of this. Forza Leicester!
I do wonder if the Premier League might become the de facto Super League of European football in the next decade. You'll still have your Barcelona/Real Madrid/Bayern/Juventus/PSG types, dominating their respective domestic competitions and strongly favored to win the Champions League, but the money flowing into the Premier League is only going to rise thanks to Leicester's performance and the increasing perception - aided and abetted by Spurs and West Ham this season as well - that any club can win not only on any given night but also, just maybe, in any given season.
I do wonder if the Premier League might become the de facto Super League of European football in the next decade. You'll still have your Barcelona/Real Madrid/Bayern/Juventus/PSG types, dominating their respective domestic competitions and strongly favored to win the Champions League, but the money flowing into the Premier League is only going to rise thanks to Leicester's performance and the increasing perception - aided and abetted by Spurs and West Ham this season as well - that any club can win not only on any given night but also, just maybe, in any given season.
I think maybe it's not possible, because you really don't have the sort of opportunities to have it happen. Maybe if a 50-year old club pro qualified for the U.S. Open by going birdie-birdie-birdie in qualification and then won the tournament box to wire and had a victory lap on the 17th and 18th hole.
It's already looking like an all-star league of international "name brand" managers. Next year Pep, Conte and probably Mourinho will arrive to join Klopp, Benitez, Wenger, Pochettino, Ranieri. Maybe even Löw and Simeone too. Moyes and Rodgers may find their way back in. Van Gaal and Hiddink types are kind of always hovering around.
Leicester will be in Pot 1 for the Champions League draw, not sure if Spurs' coefficient will be high enough to get them into Pot 2.
The big question is will Leicester be able to keep Kante (virtually no chance ), Mahrez (maybe) and Vardy (probably). Who will they be able to sign, and how will they do with a heavier fixture list (and therefore more rotation required)
The big question is will Leicester be able to keep Kante (virtually no chance ), Mahrez (maybe) and Vardy (probably). Who will they be able to sign, and how will they do with a heavier fixture list (and therefore more rotation required)
Given this is an entire season of success, it is difficult to compare it to a single event upset.
It seems closer to an expansion team winning a championship in the NFL.
It seems closer to an expansion team winning a championship in the NFL.
The DBacks had brought in a ton of expensive veterans and managed to win it. Not really anything in common at all.
There really isn't a good comparison in American sports, except maybe an unheralded school from a non-power conference somehow winning the College Football Playoff. And even that doesn't really work because of the scheduling. Leicester City isn't a team that played an easy schedule, snuck into a playoff, got hot for a month, and won a title. They went head-to-head with every team in the league over 9 months and finished in first. It's unlike anything in the US.
If Butler had won that first time in the title game, that's as close as I can think of stateside, but then the tourney is a playoff, where stuff like this has more of a chance of happening.
Except for Mahrez and Kante, a lot of the first team is 29 or older, that alone might help them hold onto a lot of them, and if they find solid replacements and add to the depth, who knows?
There are rumors that Kante's contract has a 20m release clause. If that's so, it won't be hard to find someone willing to pay it. If he doesn't have a release clause, he'll probably stay because he just signed there last year and has three years left on his contract.
Yeah its weird to compare anything. Maybe a web.com tour winner becoming the money leader on the PGA tour in the following season?
NBC Sports really doesn't understand the difference between betting odds and probabilities?
I respect Leicester a lot for what they did this season, that they made so much out of so average players and from where they came from in the last few years.
But i still don´t see it in the big picture as the biggest surprise ever.
They have average players with some great players who are national players or have the potential to play in the Euros (even Huth is rumored to come back).
The thing is, as cellar pointed out: they have spent a lot of money.
2015, they spent 50mil.€ and sold players for 10mil.€.
2014, they bought players for 22mil.€ (basically Ulloa+Kramaric) and sold players for 0.
In 2011, they spent 18mil.€ and sold players for 1mil.€. (in 12 / 13 it was basically +/- 0)
There is money and there was always money. That´s a fact.
You can say that other teams in the Premier League (or Championship) had equal or more money, I agree. (That´s the same as a salary cap team with a bottom-third cap spending salaries winning a title in a US league. I don´t understand too much of Baseball, but when the Rays were/are better than either the Yankees/Red Sox in the last 5-10 years with I guess 1/6 of their budget, isn´t that some kind of equivalent - and the MLB regular season has 162 games).
The Premier League spends more money than other leagues. Another fact.
Check a CL team, like Leverkusen. They played in the CL the last three seasons and they qualified for CL 2016/17.
2015, they bought players for 58mil.€ and sold players for 63mil.€ (notably Son to Tottenham for 30mil.)
2014, they bought players for 37mil.€ and sold players for 18mil.€.
2013, they bought players for 22mil.€ and sold players for 35mil.€
So they made a transfer loss of less than 5mil.€ in the last three years, while qualifying for the CL each season.
In contrast, you have Leicester, who were in the Championship and could afford a higher loss than Bayer Leverkusen. Why? Of course, the huge TV money.
They are predicted to make 90.9mil.pounds this season through TV money. Aston Villa (least money) is predicted to make 66.6mil. pounds this season (about 85mil.€). FC Bayern is about to make 71.9mil.€ in 2015/6. Bayer Leverkusen is about to make 56.5mil.€ in 2015/6.
Sorry, but i don´t see it as a huge surprise, if Leicester makes a few decent transfers or spends their money well. And I don´t even see them selling their players. The only one with a buy-out clause is Kante. They have the money to buy even more of those mid-sized transfer players (5-15mil.€) this summer. Additionally, they can offer international football.
To get back to the original argument: If you´re able to spend 50mil.€ per year, while about half the league spends more and half the league spends less or the same and the top money dogs (City) spend about four times your money, it´s a long, long, long shot to win the league, but it´s easily possible to finish in the top half, with sinking chances to finish Top6, Top4 or win the league.
But i still don´t see it in the big picture as the biggest surprise ever.
They have average players with some great players who are national players or have the potential to play in the Euros (even Huth is rumored to come back).
The thing is, as cellar pointed out: they have spent a lot of money.
2015, they spent 50mil.€ and sold players for 10mil.€.
2014, they bought players for 22mil.€ (basically Ulloa+Kramaric) and sold players for 0.
In 2011, they spent 18mil.€ and sold players for 1mil.€. (in 12 / 13 it was basically +/- 0)
There is money and there was always money. That´s a fact.
You can say that other teams in the Premier League (or Championship) had equal or more money, I agree. (That´s the same as a salary cap team with a bottom-third cap spending salaries winning a title in a US league. I don´t understand too much of Baseball, but when the Rays were/are better than either the Yankees/Red Sox in the last 5-10 years with I guess 1/6 of their budget, isn´t that some kind of equivalent - and the MLB regular season has 162 games).
The Premier League spends more money than other leagues. Another fact.
Check a CL team, like Leverkusen. They played in the CL the last three seasons and they qualified for CL 2016/17.
2015, they bought players for 58mil.€ and sold players for 63mil.€ (notably Son to Tottenham for 30mil.)
2014, they bought players for 37mil.€ and sold players for 18mil.€.
2013, they bought players for 22mil.€ and sold players for 35mil.€
So they made a transfer loss of less than 5mil.€ in the last three years, while qualifying for the CL each season.
In contrast, you have Leicester, who were in the Championship and could afford a higher loss than Bayer Leverkusen. Why? Of course, the huge TV money.
They are predicted to make 90.9mil.pounds this season through TV money. Aston Villa (least money) is predicted to make 66.6mil. pounds this season (about 85mil.€). FC Bayern is about to make 71.9mil.€ in 2015/6. Bayer Leverkusen is about to make 56.5mil.€ in 2015/6.
Sorry, but i don´t see it as a huge surprise, if Leicester makes a few decent transfers or spends their money well. And I don´t even see them selling their players. The only one with a buy-out clause is Kante. They have the money to buy even more of those mid-sized transfer players (5-15mil.€) this summer. Additionally, they can offer international football.
To get back to the original argument: If you´re able to spend 50mil.€ per year, while about half the league spends more and half the league spends less or the same and the top money dogs (City) spend about four times your money, it´s a long, long, long shot to win the league, but it´s easily possible to finish in the top half, with sinking chances to finish Top6, Top4 or win the league.
It really was a bit of a perfect storm for Leicester. They had a fair amount of good fortune. You're not going to have a year where all of Chelsea, Arsenal, City, and United have sustained runs of bad form like they did this year. And I think Leicester may end up with a few points fewer than traditionally wins the league. They got a bit fortunate to play some teams at the right time, too. And it just seemed like they kept getting exactly what they needed by a tiny margin. Sanchez's goal at White Hart Lane on 10 men. Hazard with the goal of the year today. Spurs failing to put away West Brom. Taking one chance and converting it while the other team kept hitting the ball at the keeper. Ulloa's penalty. And maybe the most ironic of all, they were so bad for most of last year, that even though they finished the year as arguably one of the top 6 or 7 teams, their terrible first 30 games meant they weren't worried about playing in Europe. It's just very unlikely that you see a team challenge for the premier league title when they couldn't even qualify for Europe the year before (though you may see the same with Chelsea next year). And no injury problems, on a team where depth would have been an issue.
I feel confident in saying that no premier league team ever will get as much production in one year out of 8 million pounds as Leicester did out of Morgan, Vardy and Mahrez.
But none of that detracts from the most amazing part of the thing for me, and it's how they played as front-runners for 4 months. It's just incredible to have had the pressure they've played under, but to keep grinding out results. Other than Villa, which actually drew Leicester once, there are no weeks off in the premier league. You actually have seen in the last couple of weeks that pressure take its toll, with Vardy's silly finger point and Drinkwater losing his cool a bit. There was no reason that stuff shouldn't have happened in February or March, and you just wonder if they had been caught what would have happened. That's on Ranieri I think. His demeanor as an affable, calm Italian grampa disguises his tactical abilities, but it's hard to believe the demeanor stuff didn't serve the team incredibly well over those 4 months. He seemed to be able to diffuse everything.
Small bit of trivia -- Leicester beat every other team in the premier league at least once except for Arsenal (two of their three losses), United (two draws) and, surprisingly, Bournemouth (2 draws).
I feel confident in saying that no premier league team ever will get as much production in one year out of 8 million pounds as Leicester did out of Morgan, Vardy and Mahrez.
But none of that detracts from the most amazing part of the thing for me, and it's how they played as front-runners for 4 months. It's just incredible to have had the pressure they've played under, but to keep grinding out results. Other than Villa, which actually drew Leicester once, there are no weeks off in the premier league. You actually have seen in the last couple of weeks that pressure take its toll, with Vardy's silly finger point and Drinkwater losing his cool a bit. There was no reason that stuff shouldn't have happened in February or March, and you just wonder if they had been caught what would have happened. That's on Ranieri I think. His demeanor as an affable, calm Italian grampa disguises his tactical abilities, but it's hard to believe the demeanor stuff didn't serve the team incredibly well over those 4 months. He seemed to be able to diffuse everything.
Small bit of trivia -- Leicester beat every other team in the premier league at least once except for Arsenal (two of their three losses), United (two draws) and, surprisingly, Bournemouth (2 draws).
Baseball's a reasonable comparison, being that it's uncapped and there are huge payroll disparities. Even there, you've got the draft being an equalizer. But ignoring that, this would be like if the Toledo Mud Hens won promotion to MLB (and their freedom from the Tigers' farm system), barely hung around the next few years after being pounded by MLB teams, signed a few middling FAs, all of whom immediately hit their 95th-percentile projections, all while the prospects that had been on their roster also hit 95th-percentile projections. And then the Mud Hens stormed through MLB, winning 110 games against a diverse array of baseball powers from the AL and NL, and then narrowly beat the Chicago Cubs in a 6-game world series.
edit: ...while being culturally vital to the downtrodden city of Toledo, whose supporters, though few in number, have passionately supported the team for generations despite their best players constantly being plucked by bigger-pocketed fancypants teams.
edit: ...while being culturally vital to the downtrodden city of Toledo, whose supporters, though few in number, have passionately supported the team for generations despite their best players constantly being plucked by bigger-pocketed fancypants teams.
Liverpool did this during their title challenge two years ago, and it was a huge advantage for them. As qualifying for Europe gets harder with more depth in the league, I expect we'll see more teams challenge for the league/top 4 from outside in the future.
Generally, if your model suggests something is a 5000/1 shot and then it happens, you might want to re-examine the assumptions of your model. I think Leicester have made clear that the Premier League is not the same league it was 5-10 years ago. Leicester still needed a lot of breaks, but the big clubs' advantages have shrunk.
Yeah, I don't even really know what it means to say they were 5k to 1 to win the league. Obviously not. I think that's kind of become something that gets tossed around in the US mostly to try to explain to fans of sports that don't provide a frame of reference what an accomplishment this is. That said, if you go back to the point where they were on 19 points with 9 games to play last season, this really was quite improbable, and I do think it's the case that none of us is likely to see anything like it happen again.
Some modicum of parity may be coming to the premier league, but I don't think it's nearly here yet, despite what Leicester have done. I think it's way way way premature. I really do think this was a perfect storm.
The Premier League's financial landscape has changed a lot in the last couple years and that is clearly making the league much more competitive. But I think you really exaggerate the point here. Leicester's relatively large outlays the past two years in the transfer market are not sustainable for a club in that position and were substantially due to the fact that they had been in the Championship beforehand and needed players to have a chance of staying up. Comparing them to Leverkusen is deceptive because clubs that already have stronger rosters of players can spend less money net in the transfer market. Clubs like Leicester will not be spending a net +30m in the transfer market every year, even with the new TV deal. Also, Leicester's money was in many ways spent poorly and they ended up winning the title with a starting XI in which only two players cost over 3m pounds. Their entire starting XI cost less than what United paid for Morgan Schneiderlin last summer. That's legitimately incredible and unlikely to happen again in a very long time.
Correct. Playoffs are stupid. You spend 38 weeks olaying everyone once home and away. The best team is the one who does the most after that test, not who navigates a tournament after that.
There are two in season tournaments as well but they have no bearing on the championship race
The league is just the regular season. home and away games against the other 19 teams for a 38 game season.
There are cup competitions (FA Cup and League Cup in England, Champions League and Europa League against teams from other leagues) that are more like an American-style playoff, but those are separate from league results.
EDIT: Or what Teddy said.
Football, bloody hell!
Just speechless over here. I thought Man City winning the title a couple of years ago was exhilarating, but this is just as heart-pounding.
Just speechless over here. I thought Man City winning the title a couple of years ago was exhilarating, but this is just as heart-pounding.
Well, then that is totally different than the 76ers winning the NBA Championship next year...
with a house full of Chelsea fans those of us off watch the match-congratulations-start of BPL season Leicester City was 5K-1.
Miracle Mets maybe, Cubs, definitely the Cubs. Loughborough to Southampton the taps be drained dry.
After a hundred and thirty two years for Leicester think Browns analogy in the running.
Miracle Mets maybe, Cubs, definitely the Cubs. Loughborough to Southampton the taps be drained dry.
Yeah, it'd be like the 76ers breaking the wins record and then winning the playoffs also
Hell just froze over. Don't try and analyze this, enjoy this moment. Simply an amazing accomplishment. I wish I could have watched the Spurs game today, I missed out due to interviewing people for my company. I'm pissed. How was that game with Chelsea?
Some have tried to cheapen Leicester's victory this season by pointing to the number of points they've earned as being low for a league champion. It's true that in the 23 complete seasons in the Premier League, the average points of a champion is 86. However, Leicester is not the "weakest" champion by this measure, and may yet climb the ladder a few spots with their 2 remaining games.
17. 02-03 Manchester United, 83
18. 95-96 Manchester United, 82
19. 10-11 Manchester United, 80
20. 00-01 Manchester United, 80
21. 98-99 Manchester United, 79
22. 97-98 Arsenal, 78
23. 15-16 Leicester City, 77 (2 games to play)
24. 96-97 Manchester United, 75 (runners-up Newcastle & Arsenal had 68!)
17. 02-03 Manchester United, 83
18. 95-96 Manchester United, 82
19. 10-11 Manchester United, 80
20. 00-01 Manchester United, 80
21. 98-99 Manchester United, 79
22. 97-98 Arsenal, 78
23. 15-16 Leicester City, 77 (2 games to play)
24. 96-97 Manchester United, 75 (runners-up Newcastle & Arsenal had 68!)
Good point. Why not take it on it's own merits. From now on the new standard for the unimaginable, will be - it's like Leicester City winning the league. That's plenty.
The second half of the Spurs game last night was one of the best 45 mins of sport ever. It was madness. Some of the tackles...tasty tasty stuff. It was like Rollerball. And Hazard's goal. What a goal. The Spurs players just lost it. They'll learn though.
Yeah, Hazard's goal is the most under-discussed aspect of the game. That was a rocket to the upper corner from an awkward angle, on a first-time hit, around several defenders.
Darren Rovell ESPN Senior Writer
Last night, Ladbrokes opened Leicester City as 33 to 1 to repeat as Premier League champs. Betting on Foxes has pushed odds to 25 to 1.
Last night, Ladbrokes opened Leicester City as 33 to 1 to repeat as Premier League champs. Betting on Foxes has pushed odds to 25 to 1.
Don't know,
but allegedly a book had Leicester v. Palace for the community shield on the board at 405,000 to 1 (no bets were made) it's one game away from happening.
Joe Posnanski answers the question many people have been asking here:
http://sportsworld.nbcsports.com/leicester-city-premier-league-champions/
.....all coming after a sequence in which he beat three defenders to carry the ball out of his own half, megged Kyle Walker to play a perfect pass to Costa, and then aggressively drove forward on a well timed run to get the return pass.
Where was that Eden Hazard all season? I have a feeling we'll find out in Madrid next year.
I would never bet on a swap deal although it could make sense for both clubs. Zidane/Perez are definitely rumored to be after Hazard and James seems on the way out. He is a Mendes client which also would fit a Chelsea move. I guess the big question is whether James wants to go to Chelsea, as he may have other suitors offering higher wages and/or Champions League football (maybe ManU or PSG).
That was a beautiful goal. As a Spurs fan, I'd probably have been three times more disappointed if that goal came first and the one that knocked 'em out of the title race was the horrible scuffed set piece.
To the extent it matters, Huth did end up getting charged with violent conduct for his sex masochism. In the end, it just means he won't be on the pitch for Saturday's victory lap, and that's kind of a shame. Fellaini charged too, which could have more of an impact on the final table and Europe places.
http://www.bbc.com/sport/football/36185450
http://www.bbc.com/sport/football/36185450
ESPN does a credible job exploring what Leicester's win means, with a bunch of local cultural references and stories (e.g. the "Win it for Barry" thing in their fans' Win It For thread, fully told out), and without the writer pretending that he knows anything about football on the pitch. A nice 10-min read.