Champions League gloom puts English league in bad light

By Ben James Feb 22, 2012, 9:10 GMT

London - The English Premier League, for so long the envy of Europe, is staring at Champions League disaster after Chelsea's 3-1 defeat at Napoli on Tuesday night.

Following Arsenal's 4-0 humbling at AC Milan in the first leg of their last-16 encounter, unless there is a dramatic turnaround, England could be without a quarter-finalist for the first time since 1996.

It is a stunning fall from grace for a country that has had at least one club through to the final in six of the past seven years, winning it twice in the process.

League champions Manchester United and league leaders Manchester City did not even make it out of the group stages.

'The boast (that the Premier League is best) is floating down the river,' former England manager Graham Taylor told BBC Radio 4 on Wednesday.

Arsenal's defeat in Milan increased the pressure on under-fire manager Arsene Wenger, who coincidentally began his reign at the London club in 1996.

The Frenchman has been criticised for allowing his top players to leave and not replacing them.

Chelsea manager Andre Villas-Boas was slammed by the British papers for his team selection after he left Frank Lampard, Ashley Cole and Michael Essien out of his starting line-up in Naples.

The Portuguese's response was to say that 'speculation will continue as the results don't happen.

'You can have your opinion but it was based on what was the best team in my thoughts.

'Whatever explanation I give you, in the end it would be a fantastic explanation if we'd won the game. Any explanation is now useless given the result of the game, so there's no point.'

With an away goal in the bag, it is not inconceivable that Chelsea could yet turn their tie around.

Italian football expert Gabriel Marcotti said one bad season in the Champions League did not indicate problems in a domestic league.

'The Champions League is a terrible metric to judge the strength and quality of a league,' Marcotti told BBC Radio 5 Live.

'I don't think this result (Arsenal's defeat) tells you much. It tells you something about AC Milan and about Arsenal perhaps, but not about the leagues.

'That said, Serie A, having hit rock bottom, in my opinion, in 2007 and 2008, is slowly coming back. The league is very competitive, attendances are up, TV audiences are up - it's the second biggest TV contract in the world (after the Premier League).

'If you talk about it in terms of who has the two best teams, then it's Spain. If you talk about who has the most teams competing for the title, then it's Germany. But it's been a very good season for Serie A.'

Rumours persist that some of Chelsea's senior players have fallen out with Villas-Boas over team selection and tactics; and with John Terry now on the sidelines for at least another month, they lack cohesion in defence.

Former Chelsea forward Gianfranco Zola, who also played for Napoli, said he believed the problems are mental.

'Especially psychologically, at the moment they are a little too fragile and you cannot afford that, especially at this stage of the season,' Zola said.

'You have to know what you're doing and you have to do it 100 per cent convincingly.'

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