Michel Salgado’s words from earlier that day were echoing in my mind as Barcelona notched six against Gijon while news came in that Bayern were 3-0 up on Schalke with not even half-an-hour gone.

Granted, the former Real Madrid and Spain full-back was commenting on international football — strongly expressing his opinion that the World Cup increase to 48 countries will not dilute the standard of the tournament as teams are more equal and competitive than previous eras.

“The standard just now is not like in the past. Why? Modern football is really physical. You used to go to Luxembourg or Andorra or San Marino and beat them 7, 8, 9-0.

“Nowadays, have a look at all the results — no more than 3-0, 4-0. Football is more even,” Dubai-based Salgado said.

Granted, Euro 2016, with the astonishing success stories of Iceland and Wales, and even Portugal’s triumph, was the tournament of the underdog.

In the last round of World Cup qualifiers, however, Belgium took eight off Estonia and Germany repeated that score against, yes, San Marino.

I fully understand where Salgado — a gentleman, who happily gave his time on Wednesday to speak to UAE media about Real Madrid, Zinedine Zidane, the World Cup and other topics at the third season launch of the TV show ‘The Victorious’ — is coming from.

There is evidence the gap is closing when you see South American teams such as Costa Rica and Uruguay doing so well at World Cups, and I agree with him that every continent on earth has at least one competent footballing nation in it.

But I’m just not convinced overall. And if I’m not convinced that’s the case in international football, I’m even less so when it comes to competition in club football.

Being Scottish, I have a few ‘discussions’ with fellow sports journalists and fans of the merits of the Scottish league. “Mickey Mouse league” is one arrogant comment that crops up, “two horse league” another — a one horse trot now that Celtic are 27 points clear at the top.

That’s still not as much as PSG’s 31-point margin of victory in Ligue 1 in 2015/16 though.

Furthermore, look at La Liga, particularly Real Madrid and Barcelona, and the Bundesliga, especially Bayern Munich, and the gap between the elite and the rest is alarming — and growing.

Bayern beat Hamburg 8-0 last week. Hamburg. Not ‘some wee diddy team’, to use the Scottish vernacular, but Hamburg. Granted relegation-battling Hamburg, but a former European Cup winning team. A big club.

Barcelona have recorded three sixes and two sevens this campaign. Real have a La Liga six to their name this season too.

Perhaps the only league that emerges with apparent backbone is the much-hyped ‘most competitive league in the world’ the Premier League. And then even it is skewed by the fact the extraordinary money on offer in England is one of the prime factors the other ‘Big Four’ leagues (La Liga, Bundesliga, Serie A and Ligue 1) have pushed the protective and insular revamp of the Champions League.

The Champions League, of course, being a competition where the group stages offer the most predictable fare (any other shocks bar Spurs this season?) and it only gets exciting now, when the knockout rounds begin.

At all levels of the game, the rich are getting richer and the biggest are definitely getting better. But it’s leaving the rest at sixes and sevens.

 

And finally ...

 

He may be a Manchester United player but bushy-haired Marouane Fellaini is forced to endure a lot of mockery. Unlikely to get any better with the claims by Chinese side Tianjin Quanjian that they were offered the midfielder but declined as they were looking for someone with “a different profile”.