A coronation that has been months in the making finally took place this weekend, with Manchester City clinching the Premier League title following Manchester United’s loss to lowly West Brom – more on that later.
There’s not much left to say about City’s dominance of the league this season that hasn’t already been said, but seeing members of the Sky Blues make up half of the PFA player of the year field shows just how good this side is.
Kevin De Bruyne, David Silva and Leroy Sane are all up for the award, while we’re sure the Raheem Sterling and Sergio Aguero weren’t too far off from making the cut. The remaining three nominees are no slouches, either. Manchester United’s David De Gea, Tottenham’s Harry Kane and Liverpool’s Mohamed Salah round out the field.
So, who deserves the honour? There’s only one answer and it’s the Reds’ Egyptian winger. Salah is on the verge of breaking the Premier League record for goals in a season, sitting on 30, which is one shy of the mark. He’s not just a one-trick pony, either, Salah demonstrated that with his goal this week, a marvelous looping header over the keeper off of a brilliant ball into the box by Trent Alexander-Arnold.
When you look at the other nominees, they all have their flaws.
Kane will likely be the runner-up in the Golden Boot race and certainly isn’t the creator that Salah is, with just two assists this season to the Egyptian’s 11.
David De Gea is a shoo-in as the top goalkeeper of the year and has been fantastic, but it’s hard to give this award to the keeper of a team that finished a distant second place — at best. De Gea also has more goals allowed than City’s Ederson.
As for the trio of City players, they’re likely to split the vote, hurting each other’s chances. Of the three, De Bruyne has the best shot, but his numbers don’t compare to Salah’s, either.
Even taking a broader view, Salah’s 30 goals is more than Lionel Messi’s 29 in Spain, Robert Lewandowski’s 27 in Germany, Ciro Immobile’s 27 in Italy and Edinson Cavani’s 25 in France.
Looking back, it’s amazing that Liverpool bought Salah from Roma – its Champions League semifinal opponent — for 36.9 million GBP. With the inflation of transfer fees that followed, he is easily worth at least 100 million.
PLAYER OF THE WEEK
When one thinks of an impact sub, the name Olivier Giroud isn’t the first that comes to mind.
But with the Blues trailing 2-0 to lowly Southampton, Giroud came on for Alvaro Morata and the rest was history. Chelsea scored three goals in eight minutes, with two from beautiful Frenchman himself, to come back and beat the Saints, on the road, no less.
That’s a pretty remarkable brace, if you ask me.
AROUND THE LEAGUE
You’re not going to believe this, but there’s a chance that if Man City takes its foot off the gas and punts a couple of games, that Liverpool could complete the season with the fewest losses. Currently, City has two, the Reds have four … Watching the Gunners bottle it at St. James Park is just par for the course now. With an early 1-0 lead, you can never think that Arsenal is going to hold on, even against a midtable club like Newcastle … Even worse for Arsenal, it is just two points ahead of Burnley in the table for sixth. With those two teams set to meet in Gameweek 37, that match could be a decider for a Europa League spot … For the second week in a row, Huddersfield scored a goal! You wouldn’t think that to be too much cause to celebrate against a team on early holiday like Watford, but this was the first time since February it had scored in consecutive matches … What a great first half of the M23 derby. Wilfried Zaha is a special player for Crystal Palace and should get some transfer attention this summer. Also, no, I had no clue that Crystal Palace-Brighton & Hove Albion was a derby game, either … Andy Carroll scored in the 90th minute to ruin Stoke’s day. The Potters really needed the three points in their bid to avoid relegation, but have to settle for one and stay in 19th place.
THE LAST WORD
Jose Mourinho seemingly has his typical third-year blowup starting earlier than anticipated, being his second season at Manchester United and all.
How else can you explain the many reports of players wanting out picking up by the day?
How else can you explain the inconsistency of his team on the field?
How else can you explain the decision to remove his best midfielder before the hour mark when the score’s still tied?
There are far more questions than answers at Old Trafford and this comes just a week after United’s amazing comeback win over City to delay their noisy neighbour’s title celebration.
But after beating the top team in the league on the road, United lost to the worst team in the league at home, getting blanked by lowly West Bromwich Albion.
With Anthony Martial this week saying he wants to leave this summer, Luke Shaw previously stating his unhappiness and this saga with Paul Pogba seemingly getting worse, could it be easier for United to simply sack Mourinho this summer?
The Special One has seemingly been feuding with Pogba for a while now and this week’s sub only makes it look worse. The Frenchman hasn’t been playing up to his standard under Mourinho, either, having scored fewer goals and key passes than Philippe Coutinho, who left the league in January. Pogba returned as one of the best all-around midfielders in the world and his talent is being squandered.
Whether the board decides to tolerate another season (or less) of Mourinho’s antics will be a huge storyline heading into this summer.
Oh, and if you want some context on how bad this loss to the Baggies was, West Brom’s win was its first since January 13 against the Gulls and its second since August 19 — when it had beaten Burnley to bring its record to 2-0-0.
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