For the past decade or so, every single Champions League campaign has begun with a kind of unspoken agreement among everyone watching. We tune into the qualification playoffs as if the fourth-best team from Italy or England could actually make some noise come the knockout rounds. We watch the group stage draw to see who ended up in the Impossible Group and to complain about whatever other group Manchester City inevitably receive. We watch the group stages themselves to figure out whether this was the year Napoli, or Porto, or Arsenal, could finally put a real scare into one of the contenders.
But deep down, we all knew that either Barcelona, Bayern Munich or Real Madrid were going to win and for the most part, and we were right.
In the 10 editions of the tournament before 2018-19, that trio of teams won 80% of the European Cups. Bayern nabbed one, Barca won three and Madrid took home four. Perhaps more incredibly, one of those three teams were in every final and in the years where Bayern, Barca and Madrid didn't win, it required either a historic outlier or a literal volcanic eruption to prevent them from doing so. The title changed each year, but the natural order of things was for either Bayern, or Barcelona, or Real Madrid to be the best team in the world.
However, that all changed last year.
Madrid, the three-time defending champs, got uppercut into outer space by Ajax in the round of 16 while the eventual winners, Liverpool, took out Bayern in the same round and then Barca in the semis. Liverpool's victory marked the first time since 2012 that someone outside of the Bayern-Barca-Madrid triumvirate lifted the European Cup. And the final itself, with Tottenham finishing runner-up, marked the first time that none of the three continental superpowers appeared in the final since 2008, which, coincidentally, was also an all-English matchup between Manchester United and Chelsea.
Liverpool have now been to back-to-back finals, imposing their own kind of short-term dominance over the world's premier club competition. Except, as they've done so, they've only been the second best back home. Manchester City have established themselves as the best Premier League team of all time and the most consistent club in the world right now. If Liverpool are the best team in Europe, then City are the best team on the planet, which raises the question: How many teams realistically have a shot at the Champions League this season?
Europe's old Big Three is dead. The only one preventing Liverpool and City from turning it into a Big Two is the greatest soccer player we've ever seen. This season, City will win their first title, Lionel Messi will snag his fifth Champions League trophy or Liverpool will take home their second European Cup in a row.
Here's why anything else will be a surprise.