If you apply logic and percentages to it, it makes sense, though it's probably a bit depressing.

Manuel Pellegrini leaves Sergio Aguero on the bench for Manchester City's trip to Munich. Jose Mourinho does the same with Diego Costa for the visit of Schalke. Both teams drop points.

It's hard not to conclude they were looking ahead to today, when Chelsea travel to Eastlands. And, looking at it from a cold-hearted perspective, it's equally difficult not to say they were correct to put their eggs into today's basket.

It's not a question of prioritising the league over Europe. It's simply that, right now, the group stage of the Champions League offers you plenty of chances to make up ground, whereas the head-to-head domestic clash could have far-reaching consequences.

A home win would bring City back within two points, a Chelsea win would extend their lead to eight. Obviously, with 33 games to go, making up eight points wouldn't be impossible. But it would be a heck of a lot tougher than bridging a two-point gap or even a six-point deficit.

What's more, a slip-up would be psychologically damaging to the champions, who don't want to see some of the underlying whispers - like the one about Yaya Toure and his birthday cake - turn into full-blown fissures.

It's far from straightforward for Mourinho either. Schalke were meant to be eminently beatable. Struggling in the Bundesliga and with no fewer than nine absentees, they should have been cannon fodder.

But Chelsea's wastefulness for the first hour, coupled with the German equaliser, meant he had to turn to Costa and mess up his script.

Which currently involves fielding the former Atletico man only once a week. Chelsea say it's due to a hamstring injury he suffered while on international duty earlier this month and they claim it's entirely unrelated to the hamstring problem he had at the end of last season.

Apparently what he needs is two to three weeks of total rest, but, right now, that's out of the question, so we'll see him on a part-time basis. Second-guessing medical opinion is silly, unless you happen to be a doctor and have examined the player personally. Yet you do wonder how Chelsea would cope with the worst-case scenario: an extended lay-off for the naturalised Spaniard, who has looked indispensable of late.

With Didier Drogba's performance against Schalke suggesting that he perhaps can't contribute in any other capacity than as an impact sub, that would leave a lot riding on the shoulders of Loic Remy.

Admittedly, he did score 14 goals last season for Newcastle. But then, that's only marginally better than Demba Ba managed in half a year on Tyneside.

Success in Europe remains the benchmark for both Pellegrini and Mourinho.

The former - like City - has had very little success in the Champions League, the latter wants to become the first manager to become European champion with three different clubs, following his successes at Inter and Porto. But right now it's all about the Premier League.

And you can see why.

Because we like to complain and don't like change, moaning about Euro 2020 and the way it will be spread across the continent has been second only to complaining about the expanded 24-team Euros. But as Michel Platini's plan takes shape, you can see the logic behind it. On Friday, Uefa announced the venues: the semi-final and final will be at Wembley, with another 12 cities - including Glasgow's Hampden Park - each hosting four matches.

Will it feel different? Sure. There won't be a single national identity. (But then how Polish and Ukrainian did 2012 feel? Was the Swiss and Austrian flavour that evident in 2008?) Will it penalise the fans? Of course. At least those who can afford to take a month off every four years to decamp to a foreign land.

When you then consider the venues will be nearly 50% bigger than they were at Euro 2012, that half a dozen countries who likely won't get to ever host the Euros will at least get a taste of it and - best of all - they won't leave a trail of taxpayer-funded white elephants behind, it starts to make a whole lot of sense.

Sometimes you wonder whether they make this stuff up to distract you from the real issues. The English media are all in a huff over "Watchgate", the obsession afflicting Fifa (but not just them) whereby the need is felt to shower each other with "commemorative gifts": in this case, specifically timepieces.

There are three different watch scandals to choose from here. They range from the £16,000 Parmigiani ones - which the Brazilian FA placed inside goodie bags - to the ones from Hublot (an official World Cup sponsor) - which were intercepted at Fifa HQ and sent back - right down to the cheap-and-cheerful Longines, which were handed out at Fifa's world congress and which delegates were allowed to keep because they "only" cost £120.

There are a few points to make here. First off, if we know about all this it's because Fifa's own ethics committee flagged up the "gifts" and ordered those who received them to return them (except for the Longines, which were deemed of "trivial" value). Sure, the words ethics and Fifa in the same sentence generally prompt giggles, but they can also point to the fact that in this case the system worked.

Second, follow the money. If everybody gets the gift, it's hardly a bribe. And the costs are borne not by taxpayers or fans, but by the Brazilian FA, a loaded Swiss company who make ugly watches and lavish millions on sponsorship and another Swiss watchmaker who make rather more affordable timepieces. The Brazilian "gift" came after the World Cup was assigned, the Hublot one after the sponsorship contract was done and dusted and, as for Longines, well, who really cares?

The risk here is that we talk and guffaw about "Watchgate" and lose sight of more important stuff. Like the fact Fifa say they won't publish the report by Michael Garcia, the independent investigator charged with figuring out if the bidding process for 2018 and 2022 was corrupt. Talk about not seeing the forest for the trees. And this time, the media are complicit.