Chapter 709: Chapter 708: A Rising Star Emerges in Portuguese Football
Manchester City Clinches the Premier League Title!
And with that, all of the top five European leagues have finally concluded.
The only competitions that haven’t ended are the Champions League final on May 25th.
The Europa League final on May 22nd.
And the FA Cup final on May 18th.
As previously mentioned, this year’s domestic double winner in the Portuguese league is Porto.
Not only that but Porto’s players almost swept all the major awards in the league.
Drogba scored 20 goals, edging out his teammate McCarthy to claim the Primeira Liga Golden Boot.
Deco led with 17 assists and secured the Primeira Liga Assist King title for another year.
People are nearly getting traumatized by the Primeira Liga Assist King award.
After all, the last person to dominate this award in such a way was Deng Kai!
Deco was also named the Primeira Liga Player of the Season, leading the league’s best XI.
Drogba, Pepe, Veloso, Evra, Vidic, Reina, and others were also selected for the best XI.
Pepe, with his team’s splendid record, narrowly defeated his former teammate Vidic to be named the Primeira Liga Best Defender.
Unlike the uniform success in the Primeira Liga this year, the Eredivisie next door was like a fierce battle, with high competition.
The Eredivisie champion is Ajax, led by Dutch prodigies like Ibrahimovic, Van der Vaart, and Sneijder.
The winner of the Dutch Cup, however, was Utrecht.
However, the Eredivisie Golden Boot didn’t go to a player from either of these teams but to PSV Eindhoven’s Kezman.
This season, Kezman, along with last season’s Eredivisie Best Newcomer Arjen Robben, ravaged the league and were dubbed PSV’s "Batman and Robin" by fans!
Kezman himself scored a whopping 31 goals, making him the highest goal scorer in the league this season.
Based on the rules before the year 2000, he would have won the European Golden Shoe this year.
However, since 2000, the goal coefficients for Primeira Liga and Eredivisie have been adjusted to 1.5.
Jia De’er and Cristiano Ronaldo were able to rely on their sheer number of goals to outperform the elite strikers of the top five leagues.
But Kezman clearly couldn’t do that.
Because this year in the Premier League, there were three freaks!
Still, Kezman’s goal-scoring prowess was frightening enough.
After all, trailing behind him were brilliant forwards like Kuyt, Ibrahimovic, and Van Persie.
This player has quite a significant connection with the Chinese team.
Back in 2000, when Kezman first represented Serbia in international competitions, he scored a goal against China in a friendly match, which solidified his position in the team.
That same year, he made an appearance at the European Championship but was sent off only 44 seconds after coming on as a substitute, which set a rather dubious record.
In the future, his final professional stop would be at South China Football Club in Hong Kong, where he would announce his retirement.
The Eredivisie Assist King was Barry van Galen, known as the "Alkmaar Magician," with thirteen assists.
Overtaking talented players like Van der Vaart, Robben, and Sneijder, he was a classic case of old is gold.
Within the top five leagues.
The Ligue 1 champion is undoubtedly Lyon.
They have now won the Ligue 1 title four years in a row.
And not just that, they’ve also secured the Coupe de France, demonstrating unparalleled dominance in France.
However, the Ligue 1 Golden Boot went to Djibril Cissé of Auxerre, who scored twenty-six goals in Ligue 1 and two in the UEFA Cup.
Lille: You see, Lille has something to say, too!
The Ligue 1 Assist King titles were shared by Jerome Rothen of Monaco and Fabrice of Paris Saint-Germain.
Both provided nine assists.
However, at the start of next season, Ligue 1 might be squeezed out of the world’s top five leagues by the Portuguese league.
That would discount goal and assist data by 20%.
If the status of Ligue 1 as the fifth-best league in the world has been controversial over these years, with many ranking it alongside the Portuguese and Dutch leagues as the ’three small leagues.’
The status of the Bundesliga as the world’s fourth-best league is indisputable.
After Bayern Munich reclaimed the throne, they successfully defended their title this season, winning the league championship once again.
However, the DFB-Pokal fell to Werder Bremen instead.
Bayern’s star and Brazilian fringe international, the spherical lightning Elton, took the Bundesliga by storm this season, scoring twenty-eight goals to become the Bundesliga’s top scorer.
Yet this highly renowned sharpshooter barely makes it into the Brazilian national team, not to mention the starting lineup; he often can’t even secure a spot in the twenty-three-man squad.
A single Ronaldo overshadows so many outstanding forwards!
It’s pitiful and lamentable.
The Bundesliga’s top assist providers were Bayern’s Ballack and Leverkusen’s Fran, each delivering thirteen assists.
Compared to the chaos of the Bundesliga, this year’s Serie A was relatively unified.
Or rather... this year was the rise of AC Milan!
They continued their form from last season’s Champions League, seizing both the Serie A Championship and the Coppa Italia, claiming a double crown!
Shevchenko shone with twenty-four golden balls, earning the Serie A Golden Boot.
Kaká, with fifteen goals and twelve assists, firmly established himself as AC Milan’s first-choice attacking midfielder!
Deng Kai and Cristiano Ronaldo’s national team elder, Rui Costa, now could only play a supporting role to Kaká.
But Kaká was not the assist king of Serie A.
That title went to Inter Milan’s midfield mastermind Viana, who with thirteen assists, outdid Kaká to become the Serie A’s top assist provider.
Inter Milan’s performance across all competitions this year was actually not bad at all.
In the UEFA Europa League, they might have reached the final if not for facing the formidable Manchester City, but they ended up in the top four.
Compared to the neighboring AC Milan, which has been prosperous for two consecutive years, the Nerazzurri seem rather dim.
However, it is precisely for this reason that Inter fans are all the more fervently discussing the possibility of Adriano’s return!
They’ve already acquired the best four midfield engines in Europe, now they’re just missing an Italian canon from Brazil!
Ukraine’s missile, Shevchenko, certainly dominates Serie A.
But Adriano has also reigned supreme in the Premier League this season!
In contrast, the most disappointing league of the year has to be La Liga.
The most disappointing team, without a doubt, has to be Real Madrid.
Let’s not talk about Barca.
Barca has evidently been in a period of turmoil over the past two years, lacking a clear coaching direction.
Although they’ve found the true core in Ronaldinho and have speedy generals like Quaresma to support, the team lacks the final cohesion.
Meanwhile, Real Madrid boasts four Golden Ball winners: Ronaldo, Zidane, Figo, and Raul!
Plus two Golden Ball runners-up, Carlos and Beckham, two superstar giants.
With such a glamorous lineup, they are neither the La Liga champions, King’s Cup champions, nor Champions League champions.
It’s truly a case of coming up empty in all four areas.
The only consolation is that the aforementioned honors have nothing to do with Barcelona either.
La Liga champions are the bat troop, Valencia.
As Spain’s most powerful team this season, they are about to compete with Manchester City for the European Europa League final, the second most prestigious championship trophy in European warfare!
