Manchester City
Trail Chelsea by 13 points
If Manuel Pellegrini is to be dismissed by Manchester City at the end of the season, then it will not simply be because of their failure in Europe, or to win a trophy, or to retain the Premier League title, but the nature of all three. Their season has been limp in the extreme, a half-hearted title defence being the primary concern, and the possibility that they will still finish second should not mask the very real problems that exist in their squad.
Even previously reliable players such as Yaya Touré and Pablo Zabaleta have at various points disappeared this season, Vincent Kompany continues to regress and their three significant signings since last season, Eliaquim Mangala, Fernando and Wilfried Bony, have been failures of varying degrees. At some points it has seemed as if Joe Hart and Sergio Agüero have been winning games on their own, which is just one explanation for their current position.
The problem is that this is a City squad ageing together, with only three players involved against Tottenham on Sunday younger than Agüero’s 26 years (Mangala, Bony and Dedryck Boyata), so if City are to challenge for the title again there is an argument to tear the squad apart and start again.
However, things don’t usually work like that at the best of times, particularly not with the assorted other complications of financial fair play, so a more gradual rebuilding process will have to be undertaken. Additions will have to be made in the summer, such as some strength in defence, someone such as Paul Pogba (ideally Pogba himself, although that may be a pipe dream) in midfield, particularly if Touré departs, and some pace combined with a little more guile than Jesús Navas offers in attack.
There is still enough quality in the City squad, particularly if they build around Agüero and David Silva; players such as Mangala and Bony have the talent to improve, and if Samir Nasri pulls his finger out he can still be key. But there are enough holes to suggest that, even with the required additions, they will struggle again next term. NM
Arsenal
Trail Chelsea by 16 points with two games in hand
Arsenal fans, essentially, want one thing at the beginning of each season: their team to be better than last time out. By any measure, Arsenal have done that. Since the turn of the year, in particular, they have been excellent, finding the perennially elusive balance between attack and defence and gearing up to finish with a bang.
That means achieving Champions League qualification with some comfort – unlike the normal nerve-shredding, down-to-the-wire, scramble for fourth place. Moreover, it is likely that Arsène Wenger and his players will do better than fourth which, happily, would negate the need for the traditional play-off next August. The club have always passed this test but it has frequently sapped them in the early season.
Throw in the possibility of a successful FA Cup defence – Arsenal will start the final against Aston Villa on 30 May as the favourites – and there is an unusually relaxed vibe around the club. Arsenal are past masters of jumping in and out of crisis but the Wenger Out brigade, for example, have not been saying much of late.
The problem for Wenger is that even second place is not enough. It would be extremely worthy and represent much-craved progress but Wenger’s curse, having achieved so much over the first half of his reign, is that real success means winning either the title or the Champions League.
The frustration this season has come in the lack of a title challenge. Wenger blamed a World Cup hangover for several of his key players and the latest dreadful run with injuries but the club paid a heavy price for their erratic form over the early months. Their improvement – which has featured breakthough results, most notably the win at Manchester City – has come away from the prickly heat of a championship battle.
Wenger believes that the pieces are in place to topple Chelsea and José Mourinho, whom he has not beaten in 13 attempts. Arsenal have scouted goalkeepers and defensive midfielders but the form of David Ospina and, especially, Francis Coquelin has prompted “massive changes” in how Wenger has come to assess his squad. “We are not in need of absolute change,” Wenger has said.
Chelsea and the rest, however, will strengthen and it would be remiss of Wenger to believe that his squad can evolve into champions without any external assistance. His decision to enter the first half of the season with only five senior defenders was a disaster. Boldness has to be the watchword for the summer transfer window. Arsenal are on the right track. The trouble is that they have to be perfect for the whole of next season. DH
Manchester United
Trail Chelsea by 18 points
It’s difficult to know quite what to make of Manchester United. Are they the team that cruised past Manchester City and Liverpool, or the one that couldn’t break down West Brom? If the former, then perhaps only tweaks to Louis van Gaal’s squad are required in the summer, but anything below that and even more major surgery will be in order.
Their most pressing need is for some pace in attack, with the Radamel Falcao experiment having failed and Robin van Persie fading, but they will also be in the market for a specialist full-back, a deep-lying midfielder so their best option there isn’t still, even after all these years, Michael Carrick, and some help in central defence would be handy too. And that’s not even considering whether they will need to replace David de Gea, sure to be pursued by Real Madrid. If all of these requirements are met, then United could quite easily launch a significant title challenge, but perhaps more than that is the need for them to become a little less predictable.
The past three games have seen them stymied with a worrying degree of ease, with Chelsea, Everton and West Bromwich Albion recognising that United don’t have the wit or pace in the final third to break down a team of any significant organisation. Van Gaal said on Saturday that his team had to “improve to disorganise their organisation”, which was a curious way of saying that they need to be more penetrative, but displays that the Dutchman recognises that they need to be a little less predictable.
Some of the solutions may well be internal; there is no guarantee that Ángel Di María will even be at Old Trafford next season, and Van Gaal has been extremely reluctant to use Adnan Januzaj, but if those two can get close to their best then they have the imagination, guile and speed to make United a much more dynamic attacking force.
United certainly have the potential to challenge for and even win the title next season, but it will require Van Gaal to get a large number of decisions right over the summer. NM
Liverpool
Trail Chelsea by 22 points
Next season Liverpool will benefit from a period of painful but necessary development for their young team, from venturing into the transfer market this summer to repair their eroded goal threat and will challenge for the Premier League title in the manner of 2013-14. Well, that is what Brendan Rodgers is on record as predicting anyway. Many will struggle to share such an optimistic outlook.
The areas in need of improvement are clear and yet the immediate future is surrounded by uncertainty, not least the name of the European competition they are likely to be in next season with Manchester United presenting them with an outside chance of Champions League qualification. A place in the Europa League, the stronger possibility, may impact on the Premier League prospects for a team that underwhelmed in both European tournaments this season.
Transfer targets will consider their options should Europa League football again be in store at Anfield, and Liverpool’s magnetism was not exactly overpowering last summer with Champions League football and evidence of striking domestic progress on display. That said, the club has been quick to approach Memphis Depay with the forward certain to leave PSV Eindhoven after scoring 21 goals in their title-winning campaign.
The Belgium international Divock Origi will arrive from his loan season at Lille and Danny Ings remains a possibility for a manager who is adamant Liverpool must sign a proven goalscorer able to perform “at the top level every week”. But, as Liverpool once again showed with last summer’s £117m outlay on nine players, solutions are not always found in the transfer market.
Rodgers hopes this injury-blighted season for Daniel Sturridge is a one-off, despite evidence to the contrary. It has certainly compounded the loss of Luis Suárez and brought unforeseen problems to a team that scored 101 goals when going so close to the title last May, but has only 49 in 35 league games this time out.
The manager’s position has been under scrutiny, more from the impending availability of Jürgen Klopp than signs of wavering at Fenway Sports Group over its long-term project, it has to be said, and the departure this summer of Steven Gerrard will resonate throughout a dressing room that has still to prove it has the winning mentality required at Liverpool. AH
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