The Indy Football Podcast: Has the Champions League gone because Real Madrid keep winning it?
Miguel Delaney and Sam Lovett join stand-in host Jack Pitt-Brooke to discuss the future of the world's biggest club competition, whether Real Madrid's recent dominance means the tournament has gone stale, and when and how it will be replaced by a European super-league. And will any English teams make a serious impact this year?
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Your support makes all the difference.If the Champions League is the biggest draw in world football, why does it feel so boring? The tournament that was meant to be impossible to retain but it has now been won by Real Madrid for three of the last four seasons, the perfect encapsulation of the superclub era. Real Madrid dominated in the 1950s, of course, and there have been dynasties before, so today we asked whether this is anything new or anything bad.
And if the big teams are more dominant than ever before does it mean that we will never see a winner like Ajax in 1995 again? Last year's Monaco team could have been like Ajax but they have already lost half their players to bigger, richer teams. But do people even care, in the era of Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo, about teams and players from outside the absolute elite.
But what if this is all sour grapes? There has only been one English winner this decade, after Chelsea snuck their way to the 2012 trophy, and our retreat into our own domestic game feels like it has echoes of our national politics. What happeend to the glory days of 2005 to 2012, and will we ever see anything like that again?
With Ed Malyon away on international duty, Jack Pitt-Brooke stepped into the chair today, joined by chief football writer Miguel Delaney and Sam Lovett.
Join us next Monday for the latest episode of the Indy Football Podcast, where we will discuss this weekend's Premier League games, including Chelsea v Manchester City.
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