A couple of years ago Roy Keane the former Manchester United midfielder and now pundit on TV said that celebrating survival in the league is celebrating failure. Try telling that to one of Everton, Leeds or Burnley fans this season. Keane, like some pundits can be insightful, that's their job honed by years of footballing knowledge but at times they can get it dreadfully wrong. At the risk of trying to say something that nobody has said before and come across as fresh that's when mistakes can be made. How can celebrating not being relegated be seen as celebrating failure? Should one have told Norwich who have gone back and forth from the Premier League to the Championship in recent years to calm down when they clinched promotion to the top flight? After all 'you'll be going down next season'. Should one tell either Arsenal or Tottenham this season not to be happy to clinch 4th place meaning Champions League football next season?
When survival is secured especially so late in the season the fans are not only going to celebrate they are going to go pretty wild. They are living in the moment, they are cheering not to be relegated because being relegated means something negative, there is nothing good about not playing in the top flight. Of course once the dust settles you can look back on the season and know that your team has not had a successful campaign, with plenty of defeats, but you still escaped the drop and that equates to being happy, it's a rather human emotion Roy!
The Premier League title will go down to the last day of the season but Manchester City will remain the favourites given that they have 90 points to Liverpool's 89 and also have a superior goal difference. If City can beat Aston Villa it won't matter what Liverpool do in their last game at home against Wolves. It is interesting that of all the teams to face, City will be up against Villa a team managed by Liverpool legend Steven Gerrard. He will be setting up his team and telling his team to absolutely fight for this game, Gerrard's legendary status at Liverpool would grow even more if his Villa side were able to frustrate City at the Etihad. With the Champions League final coming up for Liverpool will they be denied the quadruple or is it in their destiny to win everything?
To win the Premier League title: Man City 1.10, Liverpool 6.00
Tottenham look like they will secure 4th place and it feels like Arsenal have imploded over the past week as the Gunners were the favourites to secure Champions League football. However following their fantastic 3-0 win over Mikel Arteta's side, Tottenham beat Burnley as Arsenal lost 2-0 away to Newcastle, and now Tottenham only need to beat the bottom team Norwich to secure 4th. It would be a huge victory for manager Antonio Conte because even though Tottenham have improved over the years against Arsenal some would still say that the Gunners are the bigger side, that would really have to be questioned now.
Indeed the race for 4th will go down to the last day of the season, hasn't it been exciting? UEFA though will take that away from us in a couple of years time with their new coefficient ruling which would have wrapped up qualification for Arsenal weeks ago meaning no fight from them and no disappointment. The coefficient rule has been changed from club to country but with Arsenal failing in Europe over the past decade, save a final appearance in the Europa League the fact that Liverpool, Manchester City and Chelsea have been getting to finals means that England's points system would have reaped benefits for clubs like Arsenal. That takes away the top 4 battle run in. Of course one could argue that it will simply turn into a race for 5th place but should the Champions League really be bloated by more teams and more games? UEFA cannot be completely blamed for having to change the rules as there is constant pressure from clubs to guarantee more revenue. The threat of a Super League is still very much real, perhaps not in the format suggested last year but fans who do oppose it and who acted so quickly last time out will have to be on the ball and really look over all the little details for any new proposals. Case in point this new rule change for the Champions League has gone through as smoothly and effortlessly as a vintage goal from yesteryear.
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