How good is the Greek league without...

[Kolokotronis]

Whether or not PAO and Oly are better than Ajax and Feyenoord can be debated ad infinitum. What can't be debated is that the Dutch produce better players than us. So while the Dutch league may or may not be better than the SL, Dutch football is undoubtedly better than its Greek counterpart. Most of our assets are of the store bought variety.

[DUDE]

Whether or not PAO and Oly are better than Ajax and Feyenoord can be debated ad infinitum. What can't be debated is that the Dutch produce better players than us. So while the Dutch league may or may not be better than the SL, Dutch football is undoubtedly better than its Greek counterpart. Most of our assets are of the store bought variety.

Yes we know that, but we're talking about the leagues here. The Brazilian league isn't better than the Premiership but the Brazilians produce better players. That's a different discussion.

[AEK-MTL]

It really is a shame that in Greece, the 3 top teams don't actually play good football. By good football, I mean accurate, free-flowing, creative, etc. The title will be decided by which of the teams sucks less (and right now that seems to be OLY). Leave it to Aris, Larissa, or Tripoli to play good football.

Personally, I don't share DUDE's opinion that our top teams could beat the likes of Celtic, Rangers, Benfica, Porto, Ajax, PSV, etc. simply because our top teams are shite. However, I do prefer our chances if the competition is between leagues' middle-tier sides (i.e. Aris vs Dundee Utd, or Larissa vs FC Twente, or Asteras vs SC Braga). I wouldn't guarantee wins in this case but I think it would be a lot closer than any competition between our top sides vs their top sides.

This makes it difficult to compare leagues. Which do you take? The top sides against each other or the mid-table sides against each other?

[Morphi]

This makes it difficult to compare leagues. Which do you take? The top sides against each other or the mid-table sides against each other?

To be honest, Larissa would trash Derby easely these days :LOL:

[paxiotis7]

To be honest, Larissa would trash Derby easely these days :LOL:

:LOL:

Overall I would say the greek league is not bad and is continuing to get better. AEK-MTL you talk about Aris and Larissa and Tripolis being midle clubs. But what we havnt mentioned is that we have alota good mid table with some not bad teams. Xanthi, Panionios and Paok all have pretty good teams. So that makes nine good greek teams. Imo thats a decent league and is about 7th or 8th in europe

[DUDE]

:LOL:

Overall I would say the greek league is not bad and is continuing to get better. AEK-MTL you talk about Aris and Larissa and Tripolis being midle clubs. But what we havnt mentioned is that we have alota good mid table with some not bad teams. Xanthi, Panionios and Paok all have pretty good teams. So that makes nine good greek teams. Imo thats a decent league and is about 7th or 8th in europe

This is true, and even our big teams are decent. What makes Ajax better than our teams? In the last 2 years they've failed to qualify for the CL because they lost (AT HOME) to Dinamo Zagreb & Copenhagen. So what makes them better?

Larisa survived relegation by 1 point and they were the better side agaisnt AZ away (one of Holland's better teams), only going down to a very lucky goal. Feyenoord have done nothing of note in a very long time and PSV are doing well in the UEFA Cup but they finished begind Fener in the CL this year. So where's the evidence that the Dutch league is better than ours?

Scotland has 2 teams with the rest of the league being on a par with Cyprus. Rangers' victory (on away goals) over PAO was lucky to say the least, but before that when was the last time a Scottish team beat a Greek team? Where's the evidence that they have a better league?

Portugal have Porto, who are better than any of our teams (although I wouldn't fear them). Apart from that who do they have? Benfica? They were a decent side a 2 or 3 seasons ago, now they are terrible. They can't get goals, they lack width and they show no character. So what makes them so good? The prestigious name? They went out of the CL to Celtic, and of the UEFA Cup to relegation-threatened Nurenburg. And what about Sporting? Our top teams would beat them comfortably imo. They pass the ball well and play more attractive football then any Greek team but they are defensively weak and have no penetration. So again I ask, what makes them better?

The Turkish league is certainly not better than ours, Fenerbahce are a good side but the rest are a joke. Galatasary were completely outplayed by Larisa before the ref took over, and they were then copped 5 to Leverkusen while Besiktas copped 8 against Liverpool. And who else do they have? Can you imagine a 2 legged tie between Aris and Sivasspor for example?

The point I'm making is that the Greek league has improved alot. The distance between Europe's elite and our big sides has widened, but that's because the nature of football has changed. The Abramovich's of the world make sure of that. Man Utd beat Roma 7-0 last year ffs. Arsenal went to Milan and won 2-0 and it could have been more. Liverpool played Juve in the year they won the CL, they won 2-0 at home (and it could have been 5) and drew 0-0 in Italy, with Juve managing only 1 shot on goal. If the gap between the Prem and Serie A has become so dramatic, how on earth can the Greek league keep up? The point is though, that compared to other middle leagues the Greek league is holding up very well. Js1000 made the point that teams like Porto, Celtic, Rangers, etc would fancy their chances against us. But so what? We would fancy our chances against them. We would even fancy our chances against some of the Italian and Spanish teams that make the CL. Oly and PAO could take Sevilla if we were at our best (just like Fener took them), we could also take Lazio (like we've done already), and from next year Fiorentina. We need to improve more, no doubt about it. But this idea that the Greek league is just some joke isn't the case anymore.

[DUDE]

i'm with js1000, kolokotronis and aek-mtl on this one. the greek sides are weak and their woeful uefa position only confirms that.

greek sides are only as good as their foreigners. case closed. the best greek talent play in other leagues and any overall greek domestic talent has been severely diluted due to the mass exodus (good for those players, get out of that s%$#! league and s%$#! paragovtes) of talented greek players. it's not hard to tell, i can't stand epo, epae's, nor the scum owners/presidents/super league 'brain trust'. these are the people that enjoy the money associated with greek success, yet DO ABSOLUTELY ###### NOTHING to create, let alone maintain any kind a greek football pedigree. has epo done anything with academies, referees, pitches, infrastructure? WHAT? epo's version of spending money (pocketed TENS OF MILLIONS ON EURO IN THE PAST 4 YEARS) or beating their brains trying to maintain greece as a 'euro-quality' side is resigning a 70 year old manager. what is olympiakos' (pocketed TENS OF MILLIONS OF EURO FROM THE CL) method of being a legend in europe??? ahhh...no answer? pao? let's count every euro like the side is a family run doughnut shop. aek? let's just steal the money, this is greece...we can do this. ok, allow me to throw up now. thank you.

when those talented greek players left, no top young greek domestic talent stepped in to fill their shoes...because, young greek domestic talent pales in comparison to homegrown young domestic talent in nations with a serious youth football base (academies and/or club youth systems). quick...which greek attacking central mid replaced tsartas? which greek centerback replaced kyrgiakos? which greek striker replaced nikolaidi? which greek right fullback replaced seitaridis? dellas? fyssas? katsouranis a maxlas at ofi, donis at pao?...aman.

how can one argue the opposite, unless you're a die-hard greek nationalist.

you love greece and greek football that much? then go after the greeks themsleves in greece, my friend.

I agree with pretty much everything you've said, but you're overlooking one key thing here. Your criticism applies to the state of Greek football generally, it doesn't mean that the league itself is weak though.

For example, yes I agree with this:

greek sides are only as good as their foreigners. case closed.

But can't the same be said about these other leagues? Aren't the best players in Scotland foreign? How about in Turkey? In England? Spain? The Premiership is, imo, the best league in the world, yet the English national team is becoming a joke. La Liga has been great for years, but what has the Spanish NT ever done in football? This is because they also fail to nurture homegrown talent, and they are much bigger, richer countries.

Every criticism you've volleyed toward Greek football is bang on, and are examples of what hinders progress in Greece. Not just in football, but in all walks of life. However, this doesn't mean that the Greek league is weak. There may not be much Greek talent in that league, there may not be good enough infrastructure, there may not be much creative beauty. But we are talking about "How good is the Greek league"? And the fact is, compared to other middle leagues, the teams in the Superleague can hold their own. Whether that's a result of foreigners or not is irrelevant to this discussion.

[paxiotis7]

greek sides are only as good as their foreigners. case closed

That is sad but true. Fortunatly the greek league has some decent foreners. Fortunatly our league has alota good forgners. Aek66 is 100% right here. There is no good greek talent in the greek league. Anyone decent goes abroad. Who do oyu think is the best greek player in the greek league? Antzas, Dellas Liimberopoulos, Salpi, Pap etc etc. Most of them suck! With the expection of torosidis who is gone in the summer. Its sad but the sport is all about money, and if the epo doesnt wanna spend the money where it belongs, in the youth development etc. then we will stay the same for years.

[DUDE]

where you're holding the wrong end of the stick is where english players, or turkish players or spanish players, compliment the foreign talent on english, turkish or spanish sides. in some cases, the domestic talent of individual english, turkish or spanish sides is better or equal to the foreigners.

chelsea may be top heavy with foreigners, but cole, lampard and terry compliment chelsea's foreign legion and are 100x's better than pandos, stoltidis and antzas in complimenting olympiakos' foreigners. wright-phillips can't even get 120 minutes of football a month at chelsea. he would stroll into the greek side.

liverpool with say...english players crouch, gerrard and carragher and it's foreigners against salpi/papadopoulos, karagounis/tziolis, goumas and pao's foreigners. i think the english lot is much stronger than the greek lot that compliment a morris, a matos or an ivanshitz.

even man. u, with rooney and carrick. carrick is barely an afterthought for england, and would be greece's #1 central midfielder if carrick was greek.

fenerbache's turkish players onder, gonul, baris and borel are good enough to compliment fener's foreign legion where fener is in the CL quarter-finals...and fener lost a very good player in tuncay sanli.

i'm sorry dude, i hate to sound so negative, but i would be lying if i said the opposite. the greek league sides are weak, due to the lack of a strong core of greek domestic players. the foreign players are negligible here..

...and you know where i place the blame on this.

spain produces players, england produces players..the 'perceived' failures of those national sides don't reflect upon the overall quality, or lack of it, in league sides and domestic players.

larisa went pointless in uefa and aris drew at vikelidis with braga. what else can i say?

To be honest, I'm not sure what point you're trying to make here.

We're discussing how good the Greek league is, whether foreigners make your team or homegrown players, it's irrelevant. Teams with great domestic leagues usually have mediocre national teams (and vice versa), because instead of developing your young players you buy established foreign talent. Teams that do that are from countries like England & Spain. Teams with great national leagues and poor(ish) domestic leagues (in relative terms) are Brazil, Holland, France, Czech Rep, etc. Only Italy have managed to maintain a perfect equilibrium (but now their league is slipping too). This is a completely different discussion though. What you are talking about is the strength of Greek football with regards to Greek players, we are talking about Greek teams.

If Olympiakos buys Italy's national squad next year, PAO buys France's, AEK buy's Brazil's, Aris buy's Holland's, etc, there wouldn't be one Greek player in their teams, but we'd have the best league in the world. Antithetically, if Oly sold all her foreign players and kept only Greek players we would end up promoting young Greek talents like Katsikoyianni, Mendrinos, Mitroglou, etc. They would end up developing at a much faster rate and we would have a better selection for our NT, BUT our domestic league would go to s%$#!. This is of course a simplistic explanation, but I'm trying to point out that you are talking about something completely different, the domestic, homegrown talent you have is independent of the quality of your league. I'm saying that the Greek league is as good, or close to, and in some cases better than, the middle level leagues = Greece isn't far off Portugal, it's close to Holland, and better than Scotland, Belgium, Turkey, etc. What nationality the players are is irrelevant.

But since you do want to bring up these points, I will disagree with you. I agree with you 100% that Greece's lack of effective infrastructure, in many cases the unprofessionalism displayed, the lack of quality academies, corruption, etc, is hindering our footballing advancement (and indeed the advancement in all walks of life not just football). But it is It's absurd to say that Greek talent doesn't compliment Greek teams.

Obviously Wright-Phillips would get into any Greek team, but that overlooks the fact that England is a bigger country, spends more money on footballing development, & has a bigger fan base (i.e. higher income than Greek teams). England is also traditionally a footballing superpower, and so is bound to have better players. I'm not comparing England to Greece in terms of quality, English teams are better, we all know that, but the Greek players of Greek clubs are just as important to those clubs as the English players are to their clubs:

Torosidis, Antzas, Nikopolidis & Stoltidis are among Olympiakos' best & most important players.

Salpi, Ninis, & Goumas are among PAO's.

AEK have Lybe, Dellas, Papastathopoulos.

Panionios have Makos, Choutos, Goundoulakis.

Larisa have Venetidis, Dabizas, Boukouvalas, Fotakis, Lampropoulos, Galitsios.

PAOK has Hristodoulopoulos, Melissis, Lakis.

Even Aris who is renound for having loads of foreign players has Chalkias, Kouloucheris, and Papazoglou.

Etc.

These Greek players not only compliment the foreign players, many of them are key/star players for their teams. Whereas Arsenal, for example, rarely field an English player. Crouch never plays for Liverpool so they have 2 in Caragher and Gerrard, etc. This is globalization my friend, this is how football is nowadays, you bring in foreign talent because you believe that you can't find the equivalent at home. It's like that everywhere. Like I said, I agree that Greek football has some BIG problems, but things are no way as bad as you or Js1000 make out.

Greece is the European Champion and we've qualified with 31 points (the highest ever points tally in European qualifying) and our teams generally put in a very good showing in Europe this year. Our u-19's also made the final of the European Championships last year (and should have won!). Not bad for a country of 10 million that can only afford to spend a fraction of what her competitors spend on sports. Yes changes need to be made, but things are no where near as glum as you guys make out. In fact, overall things are looking good.

[js1000]

To be honest, I'm not sure what point you're trying to make here.

We're discussing how good the Greek league is, whether foreigners make your team or homegrown players, it's irrelevant. Teams with great domestic leagues usually have mediocre national teams (and vice versa), because instead of developing your young players you buy established foreign talent. Teams that do that are from countries like England & Spain. Teams with great national leagues and poor(ish) domestic leagues (in relative terms) are Brazil, Holland, France, Czech Rep, etc. Only Italy have managed to maintain a perfect equilibrium (but now their league is slipping too). This is a completely different discussion though. What you are talking about is the strength of Greek football with regards to Greek players, we are talking about Greek teams.

If Olympiakos buys Italy's national squad next year, PAO buys France's, AEK buy's Brazil's, Aris buy's Holland's, etc, there wouldn't be one Greek player in their teams, but we'd have the best league in the world. Antithetically, if Oly sold all her foreign players and kept only Greek players we would end up promoting young Greek talents like Katsikoyianni, Mendrinos, Mitroglou, etc. They would end up developing at a much faster rate and we would have a better selection for our NT, BUT our domestic league would go to s%$#!. This is of course a simplistic explanation, but I'm trying to point out that you are talking about something completely different, the domestic, homegrown talent you have is independent of the quality of your league. I'm saying that the Greek league is as good, or close to, and in some cases better than, the middle level leagues = Greece isn't far off Portugal, it's close to Holland, and better than Scotland, Belgium, Turkey, etc. What nationality the players are is irrelevant.

restricting foreigners does not imo benefit the national side, in turkey they allow only 6 foreign players per squad and their national side is on par with ours, restricting foreigners just weakens the league, if aek for example had more players with rivaldos quality think how much that would benefit young greek players training along side them every day, the problem in greece is that we get s%$#! foreign players. what hurts me is that our teams used to be able to compete with top european sides but thats sadly no longer the case. i want to see greek teams go as far as rangers in the uefa cup and regularly reaching champions league quarter finals.

[AEK-MTL]

:LOL:

Overall I would say the greek league is not bad and is continuing to get better. AEK-MTL you talk about Aris and Larissa and Tripolis being midle clubs. But what we havnt mentioned is that we have alota good mid table with some not bad teams. Xanthi, Panionios and Paok all have pretty good teams. So that makes nine good greek teams. Imo thats a decent league and is about 7th or 8th in europe

I agree with you that Xanthi and Panionios are good teams on their day but PAOK are garbage this year. Again, my beef isn't with the mid-table clubs. I think teams like Aris, Xanthi, Panionios, Tripoli, and Larissa could definitely hold their own in a competition with the mid-table clubs from other leagues.

However, when it comes to our top teams (especially AEK this year), we are poor and I think we'd get massacred if the competition was between the top sides from other leagues and our top sides.

To prove my point, look no further than the cup competitions. The CL is presumably for the top teams of every league. And yet OLY gets spanked every year. Now I know that CL is dominated by EPL, La Liga, and Serie A teams but you still get teams from other leagues more comparable to Greece that sometimes make it far (ex: PSV, Porto, Fenerbahce, Celtic). Of course this can change year-to-year (ex: OLY made it to final 16 this year while PSV didn't) but the fact remains that more often than not, top teams from comparable leagues do better in the CL than our teams do.

The UEFA cup, is presumably for the good mid-table clubs and we seem to have done decently well this year. This would support the argument that our mid-table sides can hold their own against teams in similar positions in rival leagues.

This begs the question; how do you compare leagues? Should we look at how competitive the league is ? (i.e. how much parity there is). Should we look at how the top clubs from our league would match up against other top clubs? Should we look at how our mid-table clubs would match up against other mid-table clubs? Should we look at how our relegation clubs match up against other relegation clubs?

All this to say, comparing leagues is very subjective. Myself, I can only go by what I've seen from the Greek league and the performance of the Greek teams in the cup competitions vs the performance of teams in comparable leagues.

[DUDE]

Well, for those that were arguing that Ajax are stronger than our big 3... Ajax failed to qualify for the CL for yet another year after losing to Twente over 2 legs.

So in the last 3 years they've failed to make it because they've lost to Copenhagen, Dinamo Zagreb and Twente... po po, omadara! :D

On a side note, Ajax, Milan, and Sevilla (if Atletico win later against Valencia) will all be in the UEFA Cup this year... That's good news for the Greek CL teams, not so good news for our UEFA Cup teams.

[js1000]

some great signings by greek teams this summer which can only be good for the super league, lets see how they perform in europe this season

[Guest TheLegend]

Panathinaikos and Olympiacos should both be able to get past groups of CL which would be a big bonus especialy of one of them got the "lucky" draw in the end and can get to the final 8

AEK should be able to do pretty decent in UEFA too. All in all I think our "big 3" should be able to get past the group of their respective competitions.

Especialy AEK since its UEFA cup I dont see an exuse to not make it to the quarter finals unless they get paired up with Milan or another big team

[drakos13]

Well, for those that were arguing that Ajax are stronger than our big 3... Ajax failed to qualify for the CL for yet another year after losing to Twente over 2 legs.

So in the last 3 years they've failed to make it because they've lost to Copenhagen, Dinamo Zagreb and Twente... po po, omadara! :D

On a side note, Ajax, Milan, and Sevilla (if Atletico win later against Valencia) will all be in the UEFA Cup this year... That's good news for the Greek CL teams, not so good news for our UEFA Cup teams.

The level of UEFA Cup is generally much harder than it used to be definitley. UEFA used to be an easier benchmark for Greek teams....these days, a run means so much more with the new format and just a better standard of play really....

There is no Greek team with a shot at winning CL or UEFA....For sure.

In UEFA in addition to those autmoatic UEFA spots you ALSO have - all the CL 3rd Qualifying round losers

(Schalke/Atletico, Spartak, FC Twente, Galata/Steaua,

and THEN add the 3rd placed CL Group teams......

and thats all with already in the torunament:

Sevilla, Milan, Valencia, Stuttgart, , CSKA, Benfica, Ajax, Hamburg, Sampdoria, Deportivo La Coruna, Racing Santander, Besiktas, Tottenham, Borusssia Dortmund, Everton, Feyernoord, and Udinese.

Sounds like a nightmare already...

and the smaller teams to beat include:

Rosenborg, Aston Villa, Rapid Bucharest, Napoli, Man City, Braga, Wolfsburg, PSG, Saint Etienne, Heerenveen, Hertha Berlin--- they are no easy 3 points either..

So, Greek teams are in huge competition...grab as much points as possible. A quarterfinal spot in the UEFA would still be very good success given the teams that going to be in it. I dont think any Greek team would breeze into the top 8.

[Genome]

until greek football and it's so-called federation, enter the 21st century...we can only expect more of the same, save for infrequent years where a rare greek success will be cheered on by screams of 'molov labe' and 'aera'. cute. this plays exactly into the hands of the criminals, theives and thugs that are responsible for the football we love.

:nw:

A shame for a country that could do way better ...

[Guest TheLegend]

perhaps some people will review their earlier opinion(s) after the hillarity of o.s.f.p, aek and aris during the past few weeks.

if one reads my posts from the past - you'll see that nothing has changed in the super league amongst the top 3, along with aris, panionios and asteras tripolis getting PREDICTABLY weaker by losing players and/or REPLACING good managers.

the fall in the overall uefa club rankings also coincides with the national team playing some sleepy football. once again, we as greeks, need to thank the f.a.'s of other nations for honing the skills of our best players.

we don't deserve sympathy, only laughs from greece's detractors. we had to earn our stripes in european club football this year after a 5-6 year slide in the uefa rankings. we failed miserably....end of story.

until greek football and it's so-called federation, enter the 21st century...we can only expect more of the same, save for infrequent years where a rare greek success will be cheered on by screams of 'molov labe' and 'aera'. cute. this plays exactly into the hands of the criminals, theives and thugs that are responsible for the football we love.

i'm not trying to toot my own horn, i feel very strongly about this stuff and i believe i'm correct. i have absolutely no interest in this year's super league, while i'll catch a national team match here and there. it's too much and anything else would insult my intelligence as i refuse to give a damn about something in the claws of scumbags, criminals and incompetants.

the fa's have nothing to do with youth on the clubs and cuz our teams (especialy osfp and aris) got unlucky and outplayed their opponents in both games but the ball was a bitch and didnt wana go in doesnt mean we are getting worse.

pao and osfp have brought in talented players this year Aris played very well but once again was unlucky Did you see how they got scored on. The greek league is still far ahead of the cypriot league despite what happend. Leagues advance with money not by what u said like the fa. That has nothing to do with it. Bring us the money the EPL has and well be at the same level as them. What player cant we get with $250,000 per week???

No money.

[js1000]

i found this article on bbc sport regarding changes to the champions league. if you scroll down the link you'll see the top 15 leagues in europe for 2009, i think they're based on coefficient points. they are as follows

1/england

2/spain

3/italy

4/germany

5/france

6/russia

7/romania

8/holland

9/portugal

10/ukraine

11/turkey

12/scotland

13/GREECE

14/switzerland

15/belgium

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/e...7736.stm#champs

we all slate the scottish league saying its bog standard but according to this its on par with the greek league.

on a posetive note the cypriot league came in 23rd (and will probably go up thanks to anorthosis) ahead of big countries like sweden(24) croatia(26) poland(27) hungary(35)

[DUDE]

i found this article on bbc sport regarding changes to the champions league. if you scroll down the link you'll see the top 15 leagues in europe for 2009, i think they're based on coefficient points. they are as follows

1/england

2/spain

3/italy

4/germany

5/france

6/russia

7/romania

8/holland

9/portugal

10/ukraine

11/turkey

12/scotland

13/GREECE

14/switzerland

15/belgium

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/e...7736.stm#champs

we all slate the scottish league saying its bog standard but according to this its on par with the greek league.

on a posetive note the cypriot league came in 23rd (and will probably go up thanks to anorthosis) ahead of big countries like sweden(24) croatia(26) poland(27) hungary(35)

So you also believe that the Romanian league is better than the Portuguese league? Btw, a few months ago I was saying the Greek league was better than the Portuguese league and you were laughing. Did you see Olympiakos vs Benfica? :whistle:

[js1000]

Like Olympiakos, Lyon have also dominated the French league. If Lyon sold many of their best players before crashing out of CL qualifying and then lying 3rd in a weak UEFA Cup group do you honestly think the fans would be happy as long as they beat PSG and finish above them? It's irrelevant what PAO and HTC are doing, the fact is that this Olympiakos team is poor! IF Panathinaikos & AEK are even poorer then this further undermines the SL, what it doesn't do is boost Olympiakos' abilities

the above is a quote from you in another thread(metalist v olympiakos thread) a view that i happen to agree with, the fact you recognise oly as poor team and they have a healthy lead at the top in greece says alot about the standard of the greek league which you pointed out.

you also added

Now the team has been embarassed and out played by teams like Anorthosis, Galatasary, and Metalist. So the foundation was there, it no longer is. Imagine Olympiakos had kept last year's squad and also signed Diogo, a goalkeeper, and a centre-back better than Antzas, i.e. Alex from Chelsea. Imagine what a team Olympiakos would have now.

i'm only critical of the greek league because i care and believe we underachieve and should be doing better.

also i'll add that the table i posted is UEFA's rankins for 2009 not anyones personal opinion

[drakos13]

i found this article on bbc sport regarding changes to the champions league. if you scroll down the link you'll see the top 15 leagues in europe for 2009, i think they're based on coefficient points. they are as follows

1/england

2/spain

3/italy

4/germany

5/france

6/russia

7/romania

8/holland

9/portugal

10/ukraine

11/turkey

12/scotland

13/GREECE

14/switzerland

15/belgium

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/e...7736.stm#champs

we all slate the scottish league saying its bog standard but according to this its on par with the greek league.

on a posetive note the cypriot league came in 23rd (and will probably go up thanks to anorthosis) ahead of big countries like sweden(24) croatia(26) poland(27) hungary(35)

So you also believe that the Romanian league is better than the Portuguese league? Btw, a few months ago I was saying the Greek league was better than the Portuguese league and you were laughing. Did you see Olympiakos vs Benfica? :whistle:

Benfica is in a terrible state and they suck.

A Portuguese person would state the obvious:

FC Porto and Sporting Lisbon are in the final 16...2 Portuguese teams.

Not to mention Braga is already qualified in their UEFA Group too.

Greece has 1 final 16, and 1 pending UEFA Cup (though OSFP will probably win )

[drakos13]

Celtics win puts Scotland back in 12th.....

http://www.contra.gr/Soccer/Europe/223662.html

we need that 12th.

PAO and OSFP have to keep winning. OSFP need to win and qualify to the next round to save Greeces hopes, or it will be left to PAO but they have a much harder task ahead...

[js1000]

olympiakos greek champions 14pts clear at the top of the greek super league get spanked 1-3 at home to st etienne who are currently in the relegation zone in the french league once again our teams flop in europe and i'm sick of it, our league is pathetic and the only way for our national team to progress is for greek players to play abroad(atleast tavlaridis was on the winning side tonight).

lets hope pao can salvage some pride next week

[DUDE]

olympiakos greek champions 14pts clear at the top of the greek super league get spanked 1-3 at home to st etienne who are currently in the relegation zone in the french league once again our teams flop in europe and i'm sick of it, our league is pathetic and the only way for our national team to progress is for greek players to play abroad(atleast tavlaridis was on the winning side tonight).

lets hope pao can salvage some pride next week

It was a shockingly bad performance, particularly from a defensive view. But let's put this into perspective for a second, it's Olympiakos' first European home defeat since losing 0-1 to Roma in 06/07, total of 9 games. One bad game is hardly reflective of the strength of Olympiakos. What it does do is highlight Olympiakos' defensive weaknesses that need to be address... Olympiakos were in the last 16 of the CL last year, going out to the finalists, and this season PAO are currently in the last 16 with a shot at the last 8.

I do agree that Greek players need to move abroad to develop though... players like Torosidis, Ninis, etc haven't developed to the extent their talent level would have allowed them to. They should get out while they can.

[drakos13]

regardless of what happened with Villa, people sure better be hoping that PAO does not slack and takes that 2nd Place this year.

Its the best hope at getting Greece points next year.

PAOK and AEK go to UEFA and win what they can. PAO would be a much bigger favourite get to the group stages again.