We can all remember a time not long ago when LaLiga was THE league to watch in world football. Yeah, the Premier League had the viewership numbers, the gaudy TV rights deals, and the most hot-button punditry, but when the bright lights were on and Cristiano Ronaldo or Lionel Messi were playing, THOSE were the games you wanted to pay to see and THOSE were the games that got everyone at the water cooler talking.
Even behind the beloved – or, in equal parts, despised – superstars of Real Madrid and Barcelona, there was so much captivating football around the Spanish top flight. Valencia, Sevilla, Villarreal, and Athletic Club were all worth a watch, producing players like Ever Banega and Dani Parejo that remain cult heroes to Spanish footballing loyalists to this day.
And at some point in the mid-2010s, Atletico Madrid became just as viable of a threat as Barcelona and Real Madrid, turning the “big two” into a legitimate “big three”.
Although that “big three” still remains and there are some quality teams remaining in LaLiga, such as Athletic Club, it feels like the overall star power, quality of football, and compelling nature of the league is slowly dissipating.
This isn’t an abrupt decline, nor is LaLiga eminently unwatchable in any way. The title race remains enthralling with three legitimate contenders, the European places are very difficult to predict, and even the relegation fight is, at least on paper, interesting from a sporting perspective.
But insidiously, the quality in LaLiga has begun to gradually decline as player retention becomes almost comically bad. Remember Gabri Veiga? The Celta Vigo starlet took the league by storm in 2022/23 as its biggest breakout star, only to leave for the Saudi Pro League one summer later at the age of 21 – a move that Toni Kroos panned as “embarrassing”.
As LaLiga continue to be embroiled in embarrassing controversies like the Spanish FA’s president sexually assaulting a women’s national team player, countless acts of racism in stadiums, an abysmal standard of refereeing that led to Real Madrid’s president requesting Premier League refs, and the unfair registration of Barcelona’s Dani Olmo, it feels like the “it’s not football, it’s LaLiga” tagline is more appropriate than it should be.
Yet all that scandal belies the most fundamental reason for LaLiga’s woes, and that is the fact that the declining quality and increasing imbalance in the league has hurt LaLiga so profoundly economically that they are falling behind.
Barcelona cannot spend, Real Madrid refuse to spend, and Atletico Madrid barely register in comparison to the heftiest earners – and spenders – in the Premier League.
During the January 2025 transfer window, LaLiga clubs spent just 26 million euros, by far the lowest spending among Europe’s top five leagues. The Bundesliga, whose clubs are mostly fan-owned, spent 172 million euros, while Manchester City threw around 214 million euros all on their own.
Since 2023, LaLiga’s expenditure is the lowest among Europe’s top five leagues – and now also behind the Saudi Pro League. You have to start the search all the way back to 2018 in order for LaLiga to eclipse the Bundesliga in spending and get out of last. LaLiga’s revenue over the last three years has been lower than that of the Bundesliga, meaning it is no longer a second fiddle to the Premier League, but, rather, a very distant third cousin.
There is only one player outside of the “big three” who is worth more than 50 million euros on the market, according to Transfermarkt, and that is Real Sociedad defensive midfielder Martin Zubimendi at 60 million; he is expected to leave to the Premier League this summer transfer window.
Spending and valuations aren’t everything, but you cannot compete at the highest level over time if you cannot buy the best players or give yourself enough of a margin of error on the transfer market by having the incoming funds to spend.
There’s a reason why Real Madrid is so reticent to spend on defenders and so obsessed with signing everyone for free. There’s a reason why Florentino has been so annoyingly fixated on a seemingly doomed Super League proposal.
LaLiga have been so overrun by poor leadership, seeding corruption, and financial mismanagement that the majority of fans are finding it difficult to watch this league or get emotionally invested if they were not already Real Madrid or Barcelona fans. And if they are not fans of those two clubs, only the occasional Lamine Yamal or Kylian Mbappe highlight will get them to take a quick glance before moving on to the next Liverpool vs. Arsenal or Manchester United vs. Chelsea fixture.
All of LaLiga’s mistakes are finally catching up to them, and while the league is not written for dead just yet, the alarm bells that diehard fans of the Spanish top flight have been sounding for years are beginning to slowly manifest in a final product that is becoming more synonymous with scandal than for great football, when, at its peaks in the early 2000s and 2010s, it was known for bringing both spectacles in equal parts. And without quality and only scandal, you no longer have a football league worth watching; you have a circus that merely exists to be gawked at from a distance.
The managing editor of The Trivela Effect, Kevin has 15 years of experience in digital media. He covered Real Madrid from 2019-2022 for The Real Champs as a site manager. You can contact him at the site’s official Twitter handle @TrivelaEffect or via the site’s official email thetrivelaeffect@gmail.com.