The biggest match, but not the best league

BARCELONA — Real Madrid is definitely the biggest match in Europe – and thus the world – and the Spanish won’t let anyone forget it.

“Which team is the best in the world?” blared Madrid sports paper Marca yesterday, as if the winner of last night’s Clasico were automatically to be crowned champions, and somehow overlooking the point that neither of them contested the Champions League final in May: one going out to the eventual winners and the other succumbing to the might of a side that finished as runners-up in France.

But in marketing terms there is no contest. Fifteen million viewers is a lot – and that was the estimated audience in the United States alone, according to ESPN.