European Football Leagues Heating Up

International soccer (or football, depending on where you’re from) is really heating up this time of year, especially with that whole World Cup event-thing taking place in June. Most specifically, the top 4 European domestic leagues all have extremely close title races, something that doesn’t usually happen often, with the big money-making teams all staking their claim for first place from the first game of the season and never letting go. This year is obviously a bit different. Let’s go first to the English Premier League, where the race for first place is down to two teams:

Chelsea: 36 games played, 25-5-6 record, +61 goal difference, 80 points
Manchester United: 36 games played, 25-4-7 record, +53 goal difference, 79 points

Clearly, Chelsea has a monster advantage in goal difference and a slim margin of one point right now. Their last two games are on the road at Liverpool, and a home match against Wigan, who infamously thumped Chelsea 3-1 earlier this season. The Blues really can’t afford to drop either of these games, especially Liverpool, who despite an uncharacteristic 10-loss season is still a tough team to beat. To make things a bit more concerning for Chelsea, Man U’s last two games are at Sunderland and against Stoke City at Old Trafford in Manchester. Two easier opponents for the Red Devils will make this an incredible finish to the Premier League season. Onto the Spanish Primera Liga, where again, it’s a two horse race:

Barcelona: 34 games played, 27-6-1 record, +63 goal difference, 87 points
Real Madrid: 34 games played, 28-2-4 record, +59 goal difference, 86 points

Another one-point difference between the two clubs, but I’ll definitely bet on Barca to win La Liga. With one loss the entire season, Barca is looking for the double of domestic and European championships, even though they were shell shocked by Inter Milan in the first leg of the Champions’ League semifinals. With the world’s best player (Lionel Messi) and best passer (Xavi Hernandez, my man-crush), the Catalans provide a stiff challenge to Real Madrid, who despite metrosexual fiend Cristiano Ronaldo and Kaka’s efforts have managed to drop 4 games this year, including two against (you guessed it) Barcelona. Now moving to Italy for Serie A action:

Inter Milan: 35 games played, 21-10-4 record, +37 goal difference, 73 points
AS Roma: 35 games played, 21-8-6 record, +23 goal difference, 71 points

Relatively close race, until you realize that Inter is playing the best football in the world right now and appear to be the new favorites for Champions League glory this year. With a couple of ugly draws this season, Jose Mourinho’s guys will hit the last 3 games of the season with a killer instinct. Even though their goal difference isn’t as high as the other league leaders in this article, Inter plays significantly better and more efficiently than Roma, who just dropped a crucial match to Sampdoria. Can stars Francesco Totti and Daniele De Rossi carry Roma to the title? We’ll have to see. Finally, our last league for today is the Bundesliga of Germany:

Bayern Munich: 32 games played, 18-10-4 record, +37 goal difference, 64 points
Schalke 04: 32 games played, 19-7-6 record, +24 goal difference, 64 points

A dead heat with the exception of Bayern completely defecating on defenses this year (hence better goal difference). However, with 6 games left for each club, anything can happen; with Munich kicking ass in the Champions League right now (behind Arjen Robben’s incredible left foot), they may not be at 100% full focus for the domestic league games. In addition, Schalke has quietly had a great season behind their striking duo of Kevin Kuranyi and Jefferson Farfan (who’s incredible in FIFA 10, if you’ve ever played.) I’d like to see Schalke pull off the upset and win the title; Bayern can have the European championship, which they may just win.