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By Bulldog Drummond
The Guardian has a list of the 30 best Premier League players today – and four of them are Arsenal players. The choices are pretty obvious: Odegaard, Saliba, Saka, Rice. Manchester City has five such players. Liverpool has four. Which means that 13 out of the 30 (43% in old money) of the top players play for three clubs – which doesn’t suggest a very balanced league.
In the lower rankings, Tottenham has three such players – so over half of the top 30 are playing for just four cubs. The highest-ranked player with another team is Aston Villa’s Watkins, who is in 13th – one of three players from that team. Which gives us 19 out of 30 players with five teams.
And that raises an issue about the old notion of this being the hardest league in the world. The fact that the same team won the Premier League for five times in the last six seasons suggests this league has, or at least had, become worse than Portugal or Spain, and more akin to France, where PSG of course win the League almost every season.
And tucked away in the background there is another issue which we’ve mentioned before – that of Spain where Girona sits in second, equal on points and games played with Real Madrid, and above Barcelona and Atletico.
This is interesting because unless and until Girona have the sort of investigation into their finances that Manchester City are getting, it would appear that the City group have evolved a method of delivering the goods they desire even in a league in which there are just three long-term established giants. This is in fact the first interference with the dominance of the three clubs since Valencia won the league a couple of times at the turn of the century.
However, there is still some difference between Spain and England, as shown by the “last ten games” league table which has Everton in fourth and Bournemouth in fifth.
| Team | P | W | D | L | F | A | GD | Pts | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Aston Villa | 10 | 7 | 2 | 1 | 19 | 10 | +9 | 23 |
| 2 | Liverpool | 10 | 6 | 4 | 0 | 19 | 7 | +12 | 22 |
| 3 | Arsenal | 10 | 6 | 2 | 2 | 20 | 10 | +10 | 20 |
| 4 | Everton | 10 | 6 | 1 | 3 | 14 | 10 | +4 | 19 |
| 5 | Bournemouth | 10 | 6 | 1 | 3 | 19 | 17 | +2 | 19 |
In short only two of the Big Seven, as we have called them, are in the top five for the last ten games, which suggests there is quite an upheaval going on. Chelsea, for all the endless talk about revivals being about to happen, are still only 14th over the last ten games.
Indeed to see just how big a change is going on we can turn to the last six games table shows which just as much upheaval
Premier League Form (Last 6) – and yes Bournemouth are the form team at the moment.
| Team | P | W | D | L | F | A | GD | Pts | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Bournemouth | 6 | 5 | 1 | 0 | 15 | 5 | +10 | 16 |
| 2 | Aston Villa | 6 | 4 | 2 | 0 | 9 | 5 | +4 | 14 |
| 3 | Arsenal | 6 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 10 | 6 | +4 | 13 |
| 4 | West Ham | 6 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 10 | 8 | +2 | 13 |
| 5 | Liverpool | 6 | 3 | 3 | 0 | 10 | 6 | +4 | 12 |
| 6 | Everton | 6 | 4 | 0 | 2 | 9 | 5 | +4 | 12 |
Certainly, anyone who spotted the revival of Bournemouth and Everton as it appeared on the horizon and placed some bets on them to do well, would now be well up in terms of their winnings. That also makes Bournemouth v Fulham an easy game to predict in the coming few days.
But what about Manchester United v Aston Villa, or Everton v Manchester City?
The Man Un game is in fact 13th v 2nd in the “last six” table, and 10th v 1st in the “last ten” games table. The new big boss of footballing affairs at Manchester United might have an impact just by being there but he has never worked in the PL before so it might be a bit tougher for Manchester United than their multiple friends in the media are suggesting.
Everton v Manchester City is even more intriguing. On the last ten games table that is second v sixth. On the last six games table that is sixth v 12th.
Of course all runs come to an end sometime, but interestingly, all three of the dead certs for relegation are currently showing a serious upturn in form. In the last six games table Burnley have won two, drawn one and lost three, and actually have a positive goal difference. They are above both Manchester clubs.
Luton are 15th in the league on the last six games and Sheffield United are 17th. Maybe not enough of an improvement to save any of them, but who would have thought that any league table could be drawn up which has Burnley above both Manchester clubs?
I am dumbfounded that journalists from the lame stream media do not know this, or so they pretend..
The only other side with eight shots on target in the first half of a Premier League game this season was Newcastle against Sheffield United in September. That ended 8-0. This arguably should be 8-0 already.