Was La Liga Spain’s 12th man in their World Cup victory this summer?

Alonso was made the player he is at sociedad not liverpool , Arbeloa at Real Madrid and Depor and El Nino at Atleti , you could make a case for Cesc and Reina but none of these players listed above have played an intrusmental in Spain's Euro win cept Torres
Alonso played a big part in the world cup win but he was already back in Spain

im not backing what José Luis Astiazarán said about La liga being the best in the world BUT la liga should RIGHTLY get credit for developing all the Euro and WC protagonists

The Albanian league is more competitive than the Spanish league lol, jk but really, La Liga is between 2 teams who rape every other team…Barcelona, a first place team, plays a 3rd placed team—what would the score be????5-0.

In England if Chelsea plays Arsenal you won't know who wins..

The Premier League is the best league in the world, then the others come…

actually, the last 4 times that chelsea have played arsenal, the aggregate score has been 11-2 to chelsea (2-1 in fa cup, 4-1, 3-0, and 2-1 in league). i know im just being pedantic there, but i dont think this article was looking for another equally arrogant claim. no league is the “best”, that's a stupid argument.

*sigh*

Of course La Liga gets credit for Spain's success. La Liga teams produced all those players you listed there. Only Cesc Fabregas can make claim of being developed mostly outside of La Liga.

Not only do La Liga teams develop these players, La Liga is also the ground for developing these talents, as the level of competition is at least amongst the top 3 in the world. Our 9th placed team just beat the Italian league champions soundly, ffs. And despite Barca and Real's ridiculous dominance last year, the league's club performances in Europe (in both Champions League and Europa League) have made it the number one ranked league in the world according to the IFFHS.

So no you shouldn't be scratching your pretty little head at this statement. Spain is not France, whose players are shipped all over the place; nor England who has one of the world's strongest leagues with few real English superstars. Just like Serie A must be credited with Italy's 2006 success (where all players played in Serie A), so must La Liga be recognized for producing and developing the players on the best national team in the world.

Seriously now, this is not the first time I have mentioned how poorly thought out your articles are, Sarah. You can't criticize another's “line of logic” and make so many mistakes of your own.

Also, this passage

'Because, according to him, Spain’s success is a result of “hard work with youth setup” that the LFP has done to promote “homegrown” talent in Spain.'

The use of quotations is just stupid. It's just snarky.

“Our 9th placed team just beat the Italian league champions soundly.”
Don't try to exaggerate that fact. That game was practically a pre-season game, and the result was more due to Inter's poorness on the night, in my opinion. It was one of those surprise victories, it doesn't mean that the 9th place La Liga team is better than the Italian champion (who coincidentally beat the Spanish champions last season…hmm). These surprises happen all the time; by that (flawed) logic Zenit would be better than Man U based on the 2008 Super Cup, and Alcorcon would be better than Real, because they beat them “soundly.” Besides, Atletico is a top 4 level team, they just had a poor league season.
I know that that wasn't the main point of your article, and I think that you didn't mean to imply that, but it's what your comment seems to allude to, and after your previous condescension I couldn't resist taking you down a notch. So, in the future, try to think out your comments slightly better next time.

Does laliga get credit for the development of young players and for their youth system?
Of course. They should.
Does Epl gets the stick for it?
Of course. They should too since they rarely give to youth chances both internationally and domestically, and someone can say that their youth policy is laughable in general terms.
La liga teams, from start to bottom have great academies and use them accordingly.Most of the clubs doesnt even have another option anyway since they dont have sugar daddies to feed them like epl clubs, and cant get expensive talent from elsewhere to fill the gaps in their teams.
I dont get the point about the fact that the two best teams , also contribute the most homegrown players to the spain squad .
So what?This means Real madrid and Barcelona have excellent youth academies, not that the rest of the teams dont have good enough ones , or that they dont use their youth.
What are you trying to imply here?

All these have little to do with league quality since epl uses foreign talent frequently anyways.
La liga is not better than epl , or worse. Its just very different.
Get off your horse trying to discredit the league just because some represantative of the league tried to promote it as the best in the world – thats his job.
And the “two horse league ” joke is getting too far , being constantly used by followers of the epl.
When was the last time someone outside of manchester and chelsea won the title? And what about before that?

What does ” better ” league mean?
How do you count it?
Marketability? Quality of footballers?
Price of footballers? Style of football?
Pitches? Youth academies and production of quality footballers?
Competitiveness?
Mind you that some of these terms are vague , but even if they are not they can always be very misleading.

for example :
As far as I am concerned the french league is far more competitive in the last two years than both la liga and epl.
What does that prove?

Also its funny when you try to predict a future scoreline between a strong , vs “not so competitively strong” team in la liga when , you know there has been already written in the history of 2010-2011 epl season ,3 6-0 results?
Try to be less biased , and respectful towards other people.

“When was the last time someone outside of manchester and chelsea won the title? And what about before that?”

Last time someone who wasn't Manchester United or Chelsea won the EPL was 2004 (Arsenal)… which was the last time a La Liga team outside of Real Madrid and Barcelona won it as well (Valencia).

Cesc was a graduate of Barcelona's youth academy, he's been with Arsenal since the age of 16 but his youth team experience was entirely in Spain. So by my reckoning, he's a La Liga product to, at least in some measure- and I agree, La Liga should get credit for developing its young talent, just look at what they've gone on to do. Not saying the league itself is perfect, but it isn't as bad as the post makes it out to be.