Chelsea, Arsenal, Liverpool and Manchester City are all desperate to taste Premier League success. For Chelsea its been a couple of years since they lifted the trophy, and for Arsenal and Liverpool, its been an even longer wait. City on the other hand will try and do anything to keep the trophy in Manchester and show their cross town rivals, that their win two years back was no accident.
Chelsea currently top the table with 57 points while Arsenal is a close second with 56. City lie third with 54 points but do have a game in hand over the top two, and Liverpool is placed fourth with 53. With 12 games left in the season, anything could still happen and the title is everyone’s to win, and lose.
The major question that is on everyone’s mind is which team will emerge triumphant. At this stage, it is an extremely difficult one to answer, owing to the fact that each of the four contenders are more than capable of handling the pressure of the title race and also as history will tell you, football has a knack of doing the unexpected. The fixture list too proves to be inconclusive.
Chelsea, Arsenal, Liverpool and City are all expected to play each other before the end of the season. If one looks into the specific fixtures of each club, Chelsea, Arsenal and City all have three tough fixtures, while Liverpool has four.
Chelsea host Spurs and Arsenal before taking a trip to Anfield to face Liverpool. The home advantage maybe something which just might help them against their London rivals, but Liverpool will be a tough challenge. If Chelsea are able to pick up reasonable points from these three games, the remainder of their fixtures don’t appear to be troublesome. Another bonus would be that unlike City and Arsenal, who still are alive in the Cups, Chelsea only has the Champions League to focus on. Often it is exhaustionof the players which lets a team down in the critical phase of the season, and on that front, it looks like Chelsea is safe.
Arsenal on the other hand are in for tough times. With trips to White Hart Lane and Stamford Bridge followed by a home game against City, Arsenal will have to work hard if they are to earn their points. Apart from these games, they face tricky encounters against Everton and Newcastle. Also having made it through to the FA Cup quarter finals and two legs against Bayern Munich coming up, Arsenal could be made to toil.
Manchester City though are what looks on the outside, as the team with the toughest fixture list. They go away to Arsenal, away to Liverpool and away to their neighbours, Manchester United. By no means are any of these games easy, but if they can pull off victories in all these games, or even go without a loss, what with their imperious showing at home, they might just end up at the top of the table.
What could hurt them though is the fact they have a League Cup final to play, a FA Cup quarter final, and two legs against Barcelona in the Champions League. And with Manuel Pelligrini clearly stating that City were going for the quadruple, the players at Etihad can expect no respite.
Even though Liverpool may just be four points off Chelsea, many people have branded Liverpool as non-existent competitors. Their chances have been written off and all that Liverpool are expected to achieve is a fourth place finish. But it really would be a folly to do so. The team that led at Christmas, did suffer a poor start to 2014 and saw them slide down the table, but the 5-1 annihilation of Arsenal at Anfield has sparked a resurgence of sorts.
Not only has it given Liverpool the belief they were seeking, it has also made all other visiting teams wary of their capabilities at home, a wariness which could help Liverpool massively considering they host Spurs, City and Chelsea, and have to make only one difficult trip to Old Trafford to face Manchester United. Also with all other Cup distractions out of the way, Liverpool might just emerge quietly from the background.
Despite it looking pretty even stevens for all four clubs, if I were to pick a club to win the title, I would have to go with Chelsea. Its not that the other three are in any way inferior, and in fact Manchester City might well trump them, the primary reason behind my backing the Blues is because they are simply playing the better football and showing more consistency as compared to the other three.
It is undeniable that Arsenal are not the same dominant team as they were at the start of the season, and injuries to key players is hurting City. Also Liverpool have been highly inconsistent lately, and just lack the depth in their squad which could hurt them. Yet it is these very weaknesses in each of the teams which could end up becoming their biggest strengths.
Arsenal may have slowed down, but they are slowly regaining their feet. What with Ozil slowly regaining top form, and Oxlaide-Chamberlain proving to be a catalyst in their last few games, Arsenal seem to be hitting top form again. They did have a bad day against Liverpool at Anfield, getting hammered 5-1, but they did manage to put it behind them, and pull of a 2-1 win in the FA cup yesterday, and that should help them immensely.
City too, are close to regaining three of their top players from injuries, namely, Aguero, Negredo and Fernandinho, and the return of this trio is just what City needs. Liverpool too are sending out strong warning signals that they mean business after their demolition of Arsenal in the Premier League, and have made sure that they just cant be counted out at the moment.
Chelsea have been in great form of late, and the away win at the Etihad was, for many, a sign that they would win the trophy, but as we saw this weekend, cup games have a weird way of throwing everything back into turmoil. City and Arsenal exacted revenge over the very teams that had comprehensively outplayed them, and this goes to show you that nothing will ever go according to the script when it comes to the Premier League.
Its destined to be an epic finale, and whichever team wins, it is going to be one hell of a finish. Even though Chelsea may have a slight advantage over their title challengers, you just cannot discount Manchester City, and Arsenal and Liverpool might just spring a surprise.
In the end it will all come down to which team is able to secure the points that they should have no problem in taking and don’t drop unnecessary points here and there, and ultimately which team is able to hold its nerve, and put in that extra bit, which helps them in becoming the 2013-2014 Barclays Premier League Champions.
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