Gary Lemke’s probably not the only one who reckons the title race is over, with City likely to wrap up the race against Chelsea on Sunday. This weekend, however, there are plenty of chances for punters to squeeze out some value before the curtain comes down on this season.
READY THE RIBBONS
The blue and white ribbons have probably already been attached to the English Premier League trophy. All that we’re awaiting is final confirmation that Manchester City are the champions, for the fifth time in the last six seasons.
Which in itself is rather remarkable. The EPL is considered the most exciting, most competitive league in the world. Where bottom can overturn top on any given day. But, at the end of it all, blue remains the colour. Manchester is blue, England is blue.
Sure, there are a couple of matches remaining. Arsenal can win their last two games, against Nottingham Forest and Wolves, which will push them to 87 points. That means City need a maximum two points from their last three games, against Chelsea, Brighton and Brentford. It’s done.
Here are some numbers as we enter the final straight, and hopefully we can still have a bit of fun as the curtain starts to come down.
Manchester City have a 56% chance to becoming just the second English team ever to complete the European treble 👀
— ESPN FC (@ESPNFC) May 18, 2023
🏆 Premier League (99%)
🏆 FA Cup (76%)
🏆 Champions League (74%) pic.twitter.com/R5RjutTjyj
Scores Galore
There have been 24 different scorelines recorded in the Premier League this season. The most common has been 1-0 (65 times), followed by 2-1 (50), 2-0 (49), 1-1 (33) and 3-0 (23). A few weeks ago we wrote about how the 0-0s have dried up and it’s only the sixth most common.
So, how about this for the maths wizards amongst us. What is the lowest scoreline combination that hasn’t been seen this season? The answer is that we’ve seen every permutation up to seven match goals. And, when it comes to eight match goals, we’re only missing 8-0, 7-1 and 4-4. Twice we’ve seen nine goals in a game – Man City beat Man United 6-3 and Man United beat Southampton 9-0.
Sacked, Sacked, Sacked
Such is the pressure of the Premier League that there have been 14 managerial sackings this season, which is a record for the League. The previous “record” was 10, which happened four times – 2008/09, 2013/14, 2017/18 and 2021/22.
It’s a sign of the times, which also makes us neutrals wonder why managers are signed for five-year contracts when some of them don’t even have the time to take the family portraits out of the box and put them on their desks.
Here’s a list of the current longest-serving managers in the league: Jurgen Klopp (Liverpool) 7 yrs, 8 months; Pep Guardiola (Man City) 6 yrs 11 months, Thomas Frank (Brentford) 4 yrs 8 months, Mikel Arteta (Arsenal) 3 yrs 6 months, David Moyes (West Ham) 3 yrs 6 months, Marco Silva (Fulham) 1 yr 11 months, Steve Cooper (Nottm Forest) 1 yr 9 months, Eddie Howe (Newcastle) 1 yr 7 months. Erik ten Hag (Man United) reaches a year in the job next week (23 May).
There has been more managerial sackings this season (14) than in any other season in Premier League history 😲 pic.twitter.com/vGmshUxA1Q
— junior Jones 🇺🇬 (@JuniorJ86922075) May 5, 2023
Post-New Year Title Race
We all know what the 2022/23 EPL table looks like. However, what if it was only for the form taken from 2023? Here’s a look at how things stand, for results only from 1 January 2023 to today. Brackets indcates where the club is for the entire season.
1 (1) Man City
2 (8) Aston Villa
3 (2) Arsenal
4 (5) Liverpool
5 (3) Newcastle
6 (4) Man United
7 (6) Brighton
8 (9) Brentford
9 (7) Tottenham
10 (13) Wolves
11 (10) Fulham
12 (15) West Ham
13 (14) Bournemouth
14 (12) Crystal Palace
15 (16) Nottm Forest
16 (11) Chelsea
17 (17) Everton
18 (18) Leeds
19 (19) Leicester
20 (20) Southampton
Reds Finding Defensive Solidity
Liverpool’s 3-0 win over Leicester was the third successive League game that they kept a clean sheet. No club has had four in a row and they are only the third club this season to do so.
The other two? Leicester and Chelsea! What happened next? Leicester actually kept five out of 6 clean sheets, and then the World Cup break came. They haven’t kept another clean sheet in 17 games. Chelsea have kept two clean sheets in their subsequent 14 games. Liverpool have got Aston Villa next.
