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News, Blog and GuidesThe ‘best’ is always a very subjective matter, but according to Opta Power Ratings, there is one clear winner when it comes to the top league in global football.
Paul Reidypaulreidy67Update: Sep 11th, 2023 12:08 EDT
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The spending power of the Saudi Pro League over the summer months has dominated the football landscape as deep pocketed Al Hilal, Al Nassr, Al Ittihad and co. have acquired the likes of Neymar, Kante, Otavio, Mahrez, Bono, Henderson and even emerging talents such as Spain’s Gabri Veiga who turned down the chance of Champions League football with Serie A champions Napoli in favour of a move to Jeddah based Al Ahli.
NJR10.. THE HISTORICAL 🔝💙@neymarjr 🇧🇷 pic.twitter.com/yXJZtzNRns
— AlHilal Saudi Club (@Alhilal_EN) September 9, 2023
Despite its emerging power the Roshn Saudi League is still some way off the pace when it comes to the best in the world and according to the latest ps from Opta. The SPL is ranked at 27 in the Top 30. This showing will inevitably change with future reports with the Saudi government determined to create a league that is talked about in the same conversation as existing elite European competitions such as the Premier League, LaLiga and Serie A.
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Nassr’s Portuguese forward #07 Cristiano Ronaldo (back) celebrates with Nassr’s Senegalese Forward #10 Sadio Mane -AFP
Premier leading the way
The Premier League is the dominant league globally and in recent years, the English top-flight has begun to pull away from their rival European leagues due to the vast riches of the league and member clubs. That dominance has been seen in European competitions in recent years. In five of the last six seasons, there has been an English side competing in the Champions League final with three English winners. Manchester City won the competition for the first time ever last season and are probably the strongest side in Europe right now. Meanwhile, West Ham United won the Europa Conference League last campaign.
Are you not entertained? 😉The stats are looking good 👀 https://t.co/ei6RwiHASj pic.twitter.com/KmO3Ie1kyU
— Premier League (@premierleague) September 8, 2023
Completing the podium
It’s not LaLiga who comes second in the ranking but the German Bundesliga which ranks as the second strongest league based on the average rating of their clubs in the Opta Power Rankings. Bayern Munich are leading the way with the reigning German champions ranked second, but RB Leipzig (seventh) and Borussia Dortmund (10th) also rank within the top 10 to help boost the Bundesliga.
Spain’s top flight do secure the bronze medal with an overall average team rating in the Opta Power Rankings of (84.1) which trails the Bundesliga with (85.4) with the highest rated La Liga club being Real Madrid’s (93.2).
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Real Madrid’s Jude Bellingham celebrates scoring their second goal VIOLETA SANTOS MOURAREUTERS
What are Opta Power Rankings?
Opta’s Power Rankings is a global team ranking system that assigns an ability score to nearly 13,500 domestic football teams on a scale between zero and 100, where zero is the worst-ranked team in the world and 100 is the best team in the world. The Power Rankings are updated daily and currently rank teams from 183 different countries and 413 unique domestic leagues, providing a truly global rating system in men’s football.
Power Rankings: Top 30
Opta Power Rankings: Top Leagues (September 2023)
1 English Premier League 87.662 German Bundesliga 84.043 Italian Serie A 83.464 Spanish La Liga 83.435 French Ligue 1 81.416 English Championship 78.587 Dutch Eredivisie 77.248 Portuguese Primeira Liga 77.209 Belgian Pro League 77.1910 Brazilian Serie A 76.4311 Swiss Super League 75.7212 Turkish Super Lig 75.6513 Russian Premier Liga 75.0814 Danish Superliga 75.0015 MLS 74.7716 Austrian Bundesliga 74.7617 Spanish La Liga 2 74.4218 Polish Ekstraklasa 73.8819 Argentine Liga Prodessional 73.6620 German 2. Bundesliga 73.6221 Croatian HNL 73.4522 Mexican Liga MX 73.2023 Cypriot First Division 72.4724 Swedish Allsvenskan 72.3025 Japanese J1 League 72.1626 South Korean K League 1 72.0927 Saudi Pro League 71.9428 Israeli Premier League 71.5629 Romanian Liga I 71.4030 Norwegian Eliteserien 71.33
