That isn't really true. Both PSG and Monaco have been in the Champions League plenty of times before and the rich Russian teams (except the short lived Anzhi) have long been Champions League regulars from way before they started spending big.

Wow that's harsh. Completely ignoring Ferguson and Wenger?

Ferguson is easily one of the most outstanding coaches ever, just look at what has happened to Man Utd with out him, the squad they have/had isn't good enough to get in to the CL, yet he was able to win the league with that exact same squad!

Wenger may not have done much recently (and I personally hate him) but when he first came to the EPL, he was nothing but outstanding. Took Arsenal to a couple titles and even went a whole season unbeaten!

That isn't really true. Both PSG and Monaco have been in the Champions League plenty of times before and the rich Russian teams (except the short lived Anzhi) have long been Champions League regulars from way before they started spending big.

For Ferguson I don't really know what more you could expect from him. He won pretty much every trophy worth winning multiple times with Man Utd and was also very succesful with Aberdeen before that. On number of trophies won I don't think anyone else comes close, certainly not recently anyway.

With regards to Wenger, yeah you're right his team is lacking now. But back in his prime that was very different.

Some of your choices are very good. I wouldn't like to say who is better but Mourinho, Ancelotti and Del Bosque are definitely at a similar level to Ferguson and Wenger. Simeone and Villas Boas however I'm not so sure about. Simeone has done brilliantly at Atletico Madrid, but before that he didn't really do much. I think he really needs another couple good seasons before we can really discuss how good he is. As for Villas Boas, he's only really had one very good season when he was at Porto. Other than that he hasn't been very good, he definitely has potential but he hasn't done anywhere near enough for me yet. He seems Mourinho like but no where near as good. He is still young though so who knows, although I think it is way to early to start calling him an outstanding coach and comparing him with the others mentioned. Trappattoni I don't really know anything about other than his days managing Ireland, so can't really comment on him.

Not entirely sure what you mean. Do you mean they have had to pretty much get a whole new team in order to get into the Champions League? If so, then fair enough. Although even then players do move around a lot now and there are quite a few good teams that have had long spells without European football so the same may well be true for some other clubs that aren't so rich.

Fair point on Zenit, although the Moscow clubs have always been big and in or around Champions League places for quite a while. Yeah they weren't really competitive back then, but even now none of them are really that competitive, which is quite surprising but oh well.

Maybe, it's hard to say. But regardless of his tactical ability Ferguson was a brilliant motivator which is a huge part of being a successful manager as well.

Hard to really comment on that. I would say a great manager should be able to get past any kind of internal conflict, although even great managers need some strong backing from the board at times to get through that. Villas Boas may yet prove himself to be one of the best managers, although I still think it's too early to say.

Yep, Simeone has done brilliantly at Atletico so far, but they have been a team with potential for a while and he really needs to prove he can maintain that level either with Atletico or elsewhere still. I wouldn't give much credit to him for winning league titles in Argentina, sure it is a success but not really comparable to the top European competitions, I mean we aren't talking about Steve McClaren being a great manager because he won the Dutch league are we?

Xabi Alonso.........centre-back?  >_>

I didn't watch the match but my friend told me that. I need someone to confirm!