Premier League Round-Up: Matchweek 35
18 yr old Phil Foden after scoring his first ever Premier League goal to give City the lead over Tottenham on Saturday
Photo Credit: Manchester City
Matchweek 35:
Man City 1-0 Tottenham
Bournemouth 0-1 Fulham
Wolves 0-0 Brighton
West Ham 2-2 Leicester
Huddersfield 1-2 Watford
Newcastle 3-1 Southampton
Everton 4-0 Man United
Cardiff 0-2 Liverpool
Arsenal 2-3 Crystal Palace
Chelsea 2-2 Burnley
Both Man City and Liverpool Keep Pace
With 3 to 4 games left for most all teams in the Premier League, the title is still undecided and is shaping up to come down to the final match day. At this point Liverpool sit with 88 pts through 35 games while Man City are on 86 pts with 34 games to play. With the game in hand Man City still control their own destiny but would you rather control your own destiny with 4 games to play and down 2 pts or have that 2 pt advantage with only 3 games left? Man City did pass one of their tougher tests on Saturday morning knocking off Tottenham 1-0 courtesy of a 5th minute goal from Phil Foden. And of course this was coming off Man City’s midweek game in which they beat Tottenham again 4-3 in the 2nd leg of their quarterfinal Champions League game but were actually knocked out of the competition on away goals. With Tottenham game down, Man City’s toughest competition from here on out will be their Wednesday match up against cross town rival Manchester United. After this midweek game, City and United will be back level on matches played. Liverpool on the other and continue to take care of business against their easy remaining schedule. They took down one of the likely relegation teams in Cardiff this past weekend 2-0. Their toughest remaining opponent actually will come on the final day of the season against Wolves.
Mourinho Was Right About United
When Jose Mourinho was canned by Manchester United in mid Decemeber, they proceeded to go on quite the run under new manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, winning 8 straight Premier League games and only losing 1 game in their next 17 games across all competitions. Well, surprise, surprise, the the United team has resorted back to who they are as a team and got smoked this past Sunday 4-0 by Everton. This 4-0 loss to Everton follows up their midweek match where they were embarrassed by Barcelona and knocked out of the Champions League. Also Man United has now lost 6 of their last 8 games since their impressive 17 game run. Former Man United legend, Gary Neville, went on a rant after the Man United game about the issue with United players and their attitudes, also saying that Mourinho and the managers before him were not the issue with the club but rather the players.
I’ve said it before and will say it again, I wouldn’t care to have Pogba anywhere near my team. He is an incredible player when playing well but is the first one to go missing when things start to go south. He’s done it time and time again throughout his career and at some point you can longer expect him to become a consistent player that can be relied on because after all he is 26 yrs old. Manchester United is the perfect example of a squad built by just throwing money at the wall. I’m not sure why United fans complain about the ownership because they’re not afraid to spend money, they’ve spent over $600 million in the last 5 seasons net of their profits from selling players. It’s kind of like talent may not be everything. You see this all the time in baseball where the best squad money can buy rarely wins in the end. I’m not saying there is as much parity in soccer as baseball, but if you think that you can just throw money at some of the best players in the world and win, well look no further than how abysmal United have been in those 5 years they’ve spent net $600 million. The 2016 Leicester City team that pulled off the unthinkable was nowhere near the most talented team in the league but their players played great as a team, they gave it 100% every game and in the end they would have died for the club. Money isn’t everything and while it’s nice to have, it’s not going to fix your problems, United. United is in the same boat as Chelsea in the fact that they could go for some major changes from top to bottom and barring a handful of players, should also go for a full rebuild.
Other Notes:
If any of the top four teams were playing halfway decent, they would be running away with the third spot. Tottenham, Arsenal and United all lose and Chelsea draw.
Huge midweek matches to get us all back on level 35 games with Tottenham taking on Brighton Tuesday in what should be an easy win, Arsenal are away at Wolves which is a tough little game on Wednesday and then United vs City in a game that could decide the title on Wednesday as well.
Callum Hudson-Odoi has ruptured his achilles just as he started to find regular starts in the first team. The recovery time for an injury this bad will easily take him deep into next season before he will return.
Chelsea bottled it again today vs Burnley and I just don’t see any way they can get top 4 at this point. Every time the door is left open, they fail to take it. Looks like it’s going to be another season of Europa League and you know what the worst part is about that? The Sunday games. Chelsea haven’t played a Saturday morning game since Feb 2 because they are too busy playing Europa League on Thursday night. Granted there is one saving grace and that could be if Chelsea win the Europa League title this year.
Both the quarterfinals in Champions League and Europa League are over and here’s the draws for the semis. In Champions League Barcelona will take on Liverpool and then Tottenham will take on Ajax. Surely Tottenham will be able to get through to the final over Ajax but then again nobody expected Ajax to get this far. Liverpool on the other hand will have their hands full with Barca to say the least.
In Europa League Chelsea will take on the German side Eintracht Frankfurt and Arsenal will take on Valencia. Finally after years of poor representation by English sides in Champions League and Europa League we have 2 teams in both semis. And my prediction is that Chelsea and Arsenal will both get through and faceoff in the Europa League final.
Thanny