Champions League — where dreams come true, fantasies become reality and legends are born. Or something like that.
Unless you are Dinamo Zagreb, Red Bull Salzburg, Celtic, Red Star Belgrade, Slovan Bratislava or Young Boys, in which case the Champions League will be full of fear, nightmares coming true and careers ruined. It's a place.
Okay, maybe not. that Unfortunately, when the UEFA national anthem is played during Matchday 3 tonight (Tuesday) and tomorrow, fans of the clubs mentioned above are understandably worried.
These teams are used to dominating their domestic leagues, winning 60 or 70 percent of their league games each year (Red Star's best winning percentage was 84 percent last season) and winning title after title.
Over the past seven domestic seasons, Dynamo, Salzburg, Celtic, Red Star, Slovan and Young Boys have achieved 38 out of 42 chances to win the league title. Dinamo have won all the Croatian championships, with Red Star also doing the same. Serbia and the rest of the country won six of the seven games available.
They are so good that they are boring in their homeland. Still, across the opening two rounds of this season's Champions League, the six teams have scored 12 goals against each other and conceded a whopping 49. This translates to a total goal difference of -37 over the 12 games.
Translating domestic bliss to European success is not easy. Especially when the budget is a fraction of the purchasing power available at Manchester City, Real Madrid and Bayern Munich.
According to transfer site Transfermarkt, Slovan have spent a total of £2.6 million (approximately JPY 340 million) on new players over the past three seasons, with the team's estimated total amount at £24 million (approximately JPY 2.4 billion). It is said that it goes up to The same source states that City have spent £365m over the past three years (which, to be honest, seems pretty frugal on their part), putting the team's value at around £1bn. It is estimated that it will be slightly more than that. That means City have spent roughly 139 times more than Slovan since 2022, making the team worth 43 times more.
When the two teams met in Round 2 three weeks ago, Slovan had odds of 40-1 to win at home. They may have dominated the Slovak title, but with a budget comparable to that of clubs in League One, the third tier of English football, they were predictably no match for City.
“We dreamed that one day the best team in the world, or one of the best teams, would come (here),” Slovakia coach Vladimir Weiss told reporters before the game. However, the reality was not so romantic. City took 28 shots, scored 4 goals, hit the woodwork 3 times, and recorded an Expected Goals (xG) figure of 3.8. Slovan had 24 percent of the possession, but no shots were recorded on target.
“Honestly, this was what we expected,” said Tomas, a Slovakian fan who watched the game. The Athletic. “Slovan hasn't played in the Champions League for 32 years (failed to qualify 11 times), so just being able to play in the Champions League is a huge success.
“When we qualified by beating (Danish champions) Midtjylland (overcoming three previous draws in a campaign that started four days before last season ended with the Euro 2024 final on July 14), It was one of our best results.''It's been a few years and it was like a European final for us.
“Then we drew against Manchester City, Bayern Munich, AC Milan and Atlético Madrid (out of eight league games). It's a game we haven't played in years, so we'll probably lose, but it's still a big prize. Celtic's loss (Slovan lost 5-1 to Glasgow in matchday 1) was not good, but even a club like Celtic has a lot more money than us.
“We have a game at home against Dinamo (Zagreb) (November 5th), a game where we can hope for a draw or a win, but above all I hope that these eight games will be a lesson for the players and the owners. That's what we make money from, spend the TVs and packed stadiums improving the team. ”
Slovakia has a unique 'happy to be there' vibe, but that doesn't apply to all Champions League minnows.
Salzburg, who have consistently qualified for the group phase of the Champions League in recent years, are set to take part in the renewed Club World Cup in America next summer, with Jurgen Klopp's Liverpool He is adjusting to life under new manager Pep Lijnders, who was his assistant for many years. He was probably considered a bit of a dark horse going into the league stage.
Instead, they had a comfortable 3-0 win against Sparta Prague and a surprising 4-0 win at home against French newcomers Brest. They sit in fourth place in the Austrian Bundesliga at the start of the season, six points behind leaders Sturm Graz, but still have two games in hand.
Pep Lijnders thanks Salzburg fans after defeat in Prague (Michal Cizek/AFP via Getty Images)
“I don't want to make excuses. I take full responsibility,” Lijnders said at a press conference after the loss to Brest. “There’s enough quality in this group that something like this shouldn’t happen, and that’s a bit worrying.
“We expected a completely different start in the Champions League, especially in the qualifications (we beat FC Twente 5-4 on aggregate and Dynamo Kyiv 3-1). I'm tired of people calling us a young team. There are no excuses, we have enough quality to win football matches in the Champions League.”
Young Boys, whose Swiss Super League is on a similar level to the Austrian Bundesliga, also lost their place in the 32-team Champions League after two defeats (3-0 at home to Aston Villa and 5-0 to Aston Villa). I would have expected more than just supporting the company. Barcelona).
Like Salzburg, the Bern club is suffering domestic woes and sacked new summer manager Patrick Rahmen a week after Barcelona's disastrous defeat. They are in 10th place in the 12-team domestic league. A visit from Inter Milan, Serie A champions and three-time European Cup/Champions League winners, awaits on Wednesday.
Dinamo also sacked their manager after losing 9-2 to Bayern last month, their heaviest defeat in Champions League history. Coach Sergei Jakirović led Dinamo to double titles in the Croatian League and Croatian Cup in the 2023-24 season, but Bayern's crushing defeat was deemed unacceptable and he resigned two days later by mutual consent.
The harsh reality of Dinamo Zagreb's European struggles comes to light on Bayern Munich's scoreboard (Sebastian Widmann/Getty Images)
The second game under new coach Nenad Bjelica, at home against Monaco, resulted in a 2-2 draw, suggesting they had made the right decision. What's next? On Wednesday, they will visit Lijnders and Salzburg.
And then there's Celtic. Unlike many of the teams mentioned above, the Scottish club are regulars in the Champions League, having enjoyed an incredible run over the years, defeating Barcelona, Juventus, Manchester United and AC Milan (and in 1967 won the Champions League). But all those wins have come at Celtic Park, where they can play against anyone, backed by one of the most enthusiastic atmospheres in European football.
Away from home is a different story. This season's competition was a microcosm of Europe for Celtic, who beat Slovan 5-1 at home before humiliating Germany's Borussia Dortmund 7-1, conceding five goals before half-time. It was the first goal conceded by an English club. Participated in major European contests from 1997 to 1998. This was their 31st defeat out of 37 away games in the Champions League group/league stage, with a total of 100 goals conceded in those 37 games.
However, manager Brendan Rodgers faced familiar criticism from his first period at Celtic, when they lost 7-0 to Barcelona at the Camp Nou and 7-1 at Paris Saint-Germain. He showed no remorse for not changing his team's approach. Or the 6-0 win over Atletico Madrid away for the second time last season.
“We're playing in a way that allows us to dominate domestically,” Rodgers said. “We know it's difficult sometimes to do that, but we still have to show what we're capable of with the ball. Are we going to sit back and camp and wait? No, we're not going to do that. .”
People have paid thousands of pounds to travel to the continent to watch teams play just two of their 37 Champions League away games (beating Spartak Moscow in 2012-13 and Belgium's Anderlecht in 2017-18). Celtic supporters who have traveled across the country may see it differently. No one would blame Celtic fans for not making the most of their overseas trips, but if anyone attended all 37 games, that would be the equivalent of around three laps around the world to see two wins. He has traveled over 10,000 miles.
“We haven't done that much, but I've never seen us win overseas,” says Celtic season ticket holder Alasdair. The Athletic. “There's always a great atmosphere on the road and no one takes for granted the privilege of being able to visit great cities and stadiums, but it's quite demoralizing.
Celtic fans enjoy a trip to Europe – until the football starts (Dean Mouhtaropoulos/Getty Images)
“Clubs may have unrealistic expectations that we should do better, but given our resources compared to the Premier League and the big clubs in Spain, Germany and Italy, we are in a different league. It turns out that the new format will only further distort the imbalance.
Although we are working with an incredibly small sample size after two rounds, early results from the expanded 36-team “league phase” suggest the scale is tipped even further. Scorelines of 9-2, 7-1, 5-0, and 5-1 were seen, along with four 4-0 runs. After 36 games, this has proven to be one of the most goal prolific editions of the Champions League, with 3.19 goals per game close to the all-time high (2019-20 season). (3.24 goals).
So far, it has been the most one-sided Champions League season ever, with an average point difference of 2.57, comfortably ahead of the next highest of 2.37 in the 1993-94 season.
Expanding the competition dilutes the quality, but at least given that you likely only need around 10 points in eight games to advance to the knockout rounds of the playoffs, this massive first stage is more expansive. could be useful for teams that play in This is where advancing to the top 16 will be at stake.
We can expect to see more of this as the rich get richer and financial imbalances widen across Europe. And fans of the Champions League minor expect to be more afraid than entertained by the continent's adventures.
(Top photo: Getty Images)
