By Daily Sports on December 6, 2016
The race for the English Premiership crown took a new twist last weekend as leaders Chelsea stunned one of their major rivals Manchester City with a 3-1 away win at the Etihad Stadium. With the win, Chelsea has gone three points clear on top of the log ahead of fellow Londoners Arsenal who hammered West Ham 5-1 away.
Many analysts had billed the Chelsea vs. City game as a potential title decider even if it is still relatively early days in the league and have jumped to the conclusion that other contenders should be discounted as pretenders.
Arise TV Correspondent Ben Uwadia is one of those who have ruled out the other top sides from the race with the simple argument that recent history doesn’t favour their chances.
The reasoning also is that Chelsea and Manchester City are rich clubs that could simply go into the transfer market in January and make the expensive additions that would guarantee them success.
With this thinking, the good form of sides like Liverpool, Arsenal and Tottenham Hotspur should not be taking seriously as they are expected to fade away when the race reaches its home stretch.
But I wonder why these people have not learnt lessons from Leicester City's march to the title last season. Why haven't these guys understood that the best predictors of success or failure have less to do with history, name recognition and how rich a club is and more to do with the present quality within the team's playing and coaching staff, the relationship and communication between the players and the coaches and luck.
It's still too early to tell perhaps which of the top sides have more of these qualities. So far, the top 5 sides presently have shown some very good sides of their tactical, technical, physical and mental organisation. It will boil down to which team can be more consistent by May.
The end shall tell. But for now, I wonder why many still choose to make predictions on who will be crowned champions come the season’s end based on the wrong indices.
Source Daily Sports
Posted December 6, 2016
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