The game definitely got harder (and better imo) with the league prestige and weighting actually factoring into things. For ages you could just hoover up the kids from Nigeria, Ivory Coast, Egypt, Serbia, Iran etc and within a few years you'd be turning sides over in the latter stages of the Gazprom and they'd never leave.
Much more difficult to get people to stay put and stay happy now if you're managing in some backwater and they fancy a move to Arsenal or something – especially when they can start considering options at the end of their contracts