Atlético won LaLiga with €100m against €400m – today the gap is bigger

To those who say Atlético won the 2014 league title with €100m and now have €400m, Rubén Uría responds with figures: Real Madrid and Barça have €1bn. The gap has not narrowed – it has grown.

Rubén Uría dismantles a common argument among supporters: that if Atlético won the 2014 league title on a €100m budget, they should find it easier now, with €400m.

His answer is numbers. In 2014 Real Madrid and Barça had €400m: a difference of four to one. Today Atlético have €400m or €500m, but they are on €1bn. The gap has not come down; it has grown or, at the very least, stayed the same, because the big two's money keeps rising. Atlético, he acknowledges, are enjoying the best financial years in their history, but they could only compete on equal terms if their rivals' resources fell and their own rose.

What the club has achieved, he says, is to establish itself on a second tier: now it would have to do things spectacularly badly to finish outside the top four. Last season Atlético were an embarrassment away from home and still finished fourth, thanks to fifteen years of Champions League football and plenty of money. But closing the gap on Real Madrid and Barça remains very difficult, and some people get frustrated with that reality.