In Defence of England

At the risk of sounding a little bigomist, I wish to take some statistics manipulated on Sky Sports News recently to task in order to dispell a few myths about the Spanish football style which appears to have become a media darling since Barcelona's conquest of England this season. The statistics have conveniently disappeared from the web and if anybody can prove me wrong, please do - but from memory this was the story.

A total of approximately 313,000 passes were completed in La Liga this during the 2010/11 season compared to the measly 304,000 completed in the Premier League. To say there were 9000 more passes made in Spain this year sounds like quite a feat, but in reality that's actually only about a 3% difference over the course of 38 games. Sky Sports News then went on to shoot themselves in the foot further as they continued with their monotonous love affair with Spanish football and Barcelona, by revealing the difference between the Catalan kings and England's highest passers, Arsenal. The Gunners were responsible for 20,000 of the Premier League's passes, whereas Barcelona made a staggering 28,000. But that's just the point... What we have here is an anomaly in Barcelona, undisputedly the best side in Europe, as we have all already seen for ourselves and been told again enough times. So should we take the two highest passing sides out of the total stats we see a very different story unravel itself. Without Arsenal, the Premier League would have made 284,000 passes, and without Barcelona low and behold La Liga would have made 285,000 passes.

So now we're getting somewhere; actually rather than English teams being the thuggish philistines this comparison suggests, actually we just don't have a side like Barcelona in our league who take apparent delight in passing the ball around relentlessly against the Blackpool's and Wigan's of the top flight. We also boast more sides capable of making life difficult for the likes of Arsenal and Man United than La Liga. One mocks the fact that the SPL is contested by the same two sides every year yet suggests that La Liga is a superior competition to the Barclay's Premiership - wrong! Statistics can be manipulated to mean whatever you want them to. There were 21 more goals in the Premiership this season than La Liga (1052 against 1031) so is Spanish football negative compared to the English style? I implore readers not to read this as the rantings of a disgruntled nationalist who has an agenda with Spanish football - I love the way Barca and Spain play, it's a joy to watch. However, it's beyond a joke that this merry-go-round of fiction which suggests our game is in utter subordination to the Spanish version is allowed to circulate. We could learn from Spanish teams; we run out of patience and ideas very quickly in comparison to their cultured professionals. But as fans we must send mixed signals to our players. We want guts, desire, goals and entertainment in England. The European prestige of English clubs is phenomenal, an English representative in 6 out of the last 7 Champions League Finals, ironically 3 of which were won by Barca! Barcelona are the nemesis here, and there is no need for this constant bombardment of our own beloved game.