And remember, before the PSG dominance it was Monaco who was the rich club, I mean Monaco isn't even in France, it's a rich small principality with casinos yachts and hotels and royal people all going to and fro, and in fact very few people are local who ever played for the club. It must have felt so surreal for people in France to watch football and see a non-French team become champions.
I have never known that Monaco used to be a big and rich club in France. Did I miss anything? I have been watching football and understood it since 2000 so far.
I know there are some seasons Monaco played very impressively in Ligue 1 and Champions League but they have never been a best or rich clubs in either France or Europe.
They had good times with Rothen, Giuly and Morientes years ago with the Champions League final against Porto with Mourinho, Deco, Carvalho. Recent years, they had good season with Mbappe and a few other players who all moved to bigger clubs.
First of all I never said "big" I said "rich". I actually even said "rich small"
As I said in this thread a few weeks ago or months when Messi moved to PSG (which is when I started following), I never watched or paid much attention to the football here but for us outsiders, Monaco, as I've explained in my post you responded to, has always been seen as a rich club (not compared to PSG of course) but for sure compared to many other clubs.
I mean, Mbappe and Fabinho used to play for them, and they were their own stars there.
Monaco is part owned by a Russian billionaire so like Chelsea's Russian rich guy, which was the reason they went up from Ligue 2 to Ligue 1 and won it. They spent over 120 million euro in 2013 alone -- that was BIG money to buy some of those stars you mentioned.
So yeah, I think we all outside see Monaco as rich club, or was rich at some point. Then they stopped spending and PSG started spending more, as they realized they were not THAT rich.
Edit: I just did a quick internet lookup and see plenty of articles especially in 2011-2015 talking about AS Monaco as a rich club. See this for example:
https://bleacherreport.com/articles/1650430-as-monaco-fc-and-5-other-clubs-with-millions-to-spend-this-summerThey talk about the top 5 rich clubs but start off mention with As Monaco