EPL titans to meet in title decider, but season lacks star power
The English Premier League (EPL) has been long derided as predictable, but as Manchester United prepares to host Chelsea on Sunday, the championship is heading for one of the tightest finishes in years.
But it has not exactly been a clash of the titans.
If there is one thing that stands out about this EPL season, it is how historically bad the leading combatants have been. Even if United wins its remaining three games, its final tally of 82 points would be the lowest total by a title winner in a decade and 13 points fewer than the record set by Chelsea in the 2004-05 campaign.
Whatever the outcome at Old Trafford on Sunday, the team that lifts the EPL trophy this year will be arguably the least impressive champion this century.
"It hasn't been a classic season by any means," Tony Barker, a member of a Chelsea supporters' group, said. "I think any of the past five or six champions would have walked away with the league this year."
And yet, with three matches remaining, there is an argument to be made that this is the most exciting season English soccer has seen in years.
Just three points separate United in top spot from second-place Chelsea, and there is a good chance the title could be decided by goal differential for the first time in EPL history. Even Arsenal could be back in the hunt come Sunday, potentially three points behind with two games to play, despite repeatedly self-destructing down the stretch.
Evidence of a decline among English soccer's ruling class has been clear for some time. In the five seasons prior to the 2009-10 campaign, the Premier League provided 12 of the 20 Champions League semi-finalists, six finalists and two winners. Since then, only one team -- Manchester United, which will contest this year's final -- has advanced past the quarter-finals.
But rarely has there been a year when all of England's top clubs showed themselves to be so flawed all at the same time. United is short on creativity, Chelsea suffered an epic mid-season slump, Arsenal remains flaky and Manchester City struggled to gel. Even Liverpool, which occupies fifth place, spent the first half of the season flirting with relegation.
All of which has turned conventional thinking about EPL title races on its head. Usually, the team that wins the league does so in one of two ways -- by being significantly more organized than its opponents and grinding out 1-0 wins or by being significantly better than its opponents and putting the weakest teams to the sword.
This season, that is not the case. Manchester United sits at the top of the standings but has completed only four 1-0 victories in 35 league games and has held its opponents scoreless in just 43 percent of those matchups -- its lowest figure since the 2003-04 season. At the same time, United has won by three goals on just five occasions this season, fewer than any of the past nine EPL champions.
"Maybe the individuals have not shone as brightly for United this season," Fulham manager Mark Hughes said. "There's not those key elements to the team where people will jump out of their seats."
In the past four seasons, the Premier League champion has averaged roughly 11 away wins. This season, Arsenal leads the way with eight wins on its travels, while United has won just five of its 18 games on the road -- the same number as Blackpool and Newcastle United.
This remarkable slump at the top of the standings surely has something to do with last summer's World Cup. The Premier League's best players, who mostly play for the biggest teams, returned tired or ran out of steam early. Wayne Rooney and Fernando Torres disappointed in South Africa, and that form lingered into the season. Frank Lampard and Cesc Fabregas have been in and out of the treatment room with significant injuries.
The absence of key players after a period of restrained recruitment means England's top clubs have lacked something they have come to rely on in previous seasons -- an excess of high-quality players capable of providing a winning moment of quality in the tightest games.
Gianfranco Zola, the former Chelsea forward, said, "There was no superstar."
