The last international break of the season has come and gone, no more boring interruptions this season. Some teams came out out it much worse than their rivals (looking in the general direction of Everton) and will be desperately hoping that their run-in doesn’t suffer as a result. From now to the end of the season, what began as a marathon morphs into a sprint and the best positioned teams will be looking to finish as strongly as possible. Here are some of the weekend’s talking points.
Liverpool Dispatch Everton
Everton went into the game as one of the form teams in the league but had been decimated after the international break. Liverpool on the other hand had a very strong six against teams in the top seven. In the end, it finished the only way most expected – a Liverpool win. The harsh 3-1 scoreline might not tell the complete story of the game but
Liverpool deserved to win and Everton didn’t create much. The Toffees will be disappointed with the performance of Joel Robles in goal and Maarten Stekelenburg might now be confident about getting his place back after dropping out due to injury. Everton’s expectedly futile battle for the Champions league places continues with a visit to Old Trafford while The Reds next host Bournemouth. With this victory, Jürgen Klopp’s men are now assured of not finishing seventh but their sights are set higher and will back themselves to not finish lower than fourth. It’s going to be an interesting run-in.
Manchester United Descend into Self Parody
This has been a season of farce for Manchester United. The fans might be conveniently ignoring and the media might have decided to swoon over Jose Mourinho but no amount of ignorance can hide the fact that this season’s under-performance is only comparable to that of David Moyes. It would be best to forget the game itself as it finished 0-0 with only four shots on target, three of those shots by the home team. Earlier in the season when the team wasn’t getting the expected results, excuses like the “style of play has improved”, “the team is unlucky” and the most hilarious of all “this isn’t Mourinho’s team” were bandied about. Now, failing to score goals because you aren’t creating good enough chances isn’t luck, it’s being poor tactically. If you create good chances, the odds are that you’ll score goals.Manchester United have won less than fifty percent of their home games and scored only twenty goals in those games. Teams like Burnley, Swansea, Hull, Watford and Bournemouth have scored more goals at home. The Red Devils have not lost a league game since October but they’ve failed to win nine of the nineteen games in that sequence. Looking at this season in any way, it points to failure for the club and there’s a good chance that the season will end with the club in sixth place. The consensus last season was that the club under-performed to finish level on points with the fourth placed team, meaning the acceptable position would’ve been second or third. They went out and invested massively on the squad so finishing sixth should be unthinkable.
Spurs Keep Ticking
Speaking on investing on squads, Spurs collapsed in their chase of Leicester last season and somehow contrived to finish third. Right now, they’re on course to better that finish by one place. The two main signings to deepen their squad haven’t really worked. Moussa Sissoko has been a massive let down for them but such things haven’t held the team back. They are, right now, Chelsea’s main challengers and are carefully plugging away without any of the attention being shown to the trainwreck at Manchester United or the stench at Arsenal. They’ll be grateful that others are taking away the spotlight while they go around picking up wins. Their 2-0 win at Burnley was only the Claret’s fourth home defeat and was Spurs’ fourth straight win. Spurs have now won eleven of their last fourteen league games, losing only
once. They have the best defence and have kept thirteen clean sheets. They are three points ahead of Liverpool, in third place, who have played one game more. And they now find themselves only seven points behind Chelsea. They next face a Swansea side with the worst defence in the league before playing two straight home games. They have the
potential to scare Chelsea in the title race.
Chelsea Give Rivals Flicker of Hope
Well, what do we have here. Chelsea fell to a resurgent Crystal Palace side to give their rivals a chance of making the title race interesting again. They lost 2-1 in this London derby and can’t really complain about it. Before the game, Crystal Palace had won three straight games to give them some space in the relegation fight but this was Chelsea, the champions-elect, coming to town. It was expected to be a hard-fought win for the leaders, but a win nonetheless. The
Eagles stretched their winning run to four games and that leaves Chelsea seven points ahead of second place. Things could get really interesting in the coming weeks as Chelsea next host Manchester City. At the end of the midweek fixtures, the lead at the top could become four points. If that happens, the prospect of a genuine race again opens up because the Blues still have two tough away games to navigate; games at Goodison Park and Old Trafford.
Arsenal Salvage Point
Coming into this game with one win in five games and what can only be described as being in strife, the Gunners needed to not lose this game. Their manager said as much at the end. The effects of losing the game would have been substantial, the effects on the fans, the players and the club. They managed to snatch a draw from a game that, at some points, looked like it was going to be a comprehensive defeat. As their manager would say, they showed mental strength but still find themselves in sixth. They didn’t take advantage of Manchester United’s slip earlier in the day. They can still finish in third but that’s not likely to happen. They’ll have to take full advantage of their next three league games against teams fourteenth and below. They can get into a winning rhythm with those games and gain some confidence before the start of a tough period. A season that started so well is following the familiar pattern of collapse in February and March but it’s left to see if there’ll be a recovery and strong run in April and May. Even if that does happen, it’s almost certain that they’ll now finish outside the top four for the first time in aeons.
Written by Omorogbe Usuomon
The post Chelsea’s defeat gives the chasing pack hope, Liverpool continues dominance of the Merseyside derby and other talking points from the Premier League Week 30 appeared first on Soccer Nation.
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