New Delhi: With the first midweek matchday of the season in the history books now, it’s safe to say that the festive season in the footballing calendar is well and truly underway. This matchday gave us a lot to talk about ranging from Arsenal’s big win over Manchester United, Manchester City’s return to winning ways, Spurs doing what Spurs do best and Liverpool dropping points for only the third time this season.
The relegation spots seem to be settling in and it looks likely that at least some combination of the three teams occupying them currently will go down come the end of the season. However, things looked good for teams just above the relegation zone as both Everton and Crystal Palace earned some huge, much needed wins while Ruud Van Nistelrooy started his Leicester career with a win. Let’s dive in to find out the five things we learnt from Matchday 10 of the season.
5) Ange Postecoglou looks like he’s joining the sack race
Tottenham in the Premier League since winning 4-0 at Man City:
Drew 1-1 at home to Fulham
Lost 1-0 away to Bournemouth
🤷♂️ pic.twitter.com/0OvQ0DZfMz
— B/R Football (@brfootball) December 5, 2024
Like we’ve been saying for a few weeks now, Spurs are proving themselves to be the Robinhood of the league on every chance they get. Since thrashing Manchester City 4-0 at their own turf, the Lilywhites have dropped points in both the games they’ve played since. Just last night, they lost 1-0 to Bournemouth, leaving them 10th in the Premier League table, making them the second lowest placed side of the ‘big six.’ The loss to Bournemouth was Spurs’ sixth loss of the season and leaves them six points behind of the top four.
In such a closely contested race for the top four, being six points behind is a huge gap to overcome. They have the same number of losses as 17th placed Crystal Palace and just one less loss than Ipswich Town, who occupy one of the relegation spots. It is also the same number of losses that Steve Cooper had managed before he was given the boot at Leicester. With the relationship straining further between the Spurs faithful and Ange after last night, it seems like he could also be amongst the names that get sacked next in the league.
4) Southampton seem destined for the drop
The only way Southampton’s Jack Stephens could stop Marc Cucurella 😅 pic.twitter.com/1RHgxlJm8R
— ESPN UK (@ESPNUK) December 5, 2024
Things haven’t been looking good for the Saints since the first matchday of the season and after more than a third of the season, their fortunes haven’t changed yet. After 14 games of the season, they’ve only managed to earn a measly five points in the season and were just thrashed 5-1 at home by Chelsea. Russell Martin’s men seem like they’re on their way back to the Championship at the first time of asking.
They’ve lost 11 matches already in the season and no team in the league has lost 11 out of their first 14 games and stayed up till now. The least number of points that a team has managed and still stayed up is 32 and based on current form, they’re on course to get to just 14 points, which is only three points more than the worst ever Premier League team, the 2007/08 Derby County side. They need nothing short of a miracle at this point to avoid the drop.
3) Enzo Maresca is proving his doubters wrong
Chelsea have scored 57 goals in 22 games this season, their best-ever goals-per-game ratio in history (2.6 goals-per-game).
They also set a new record for the highest xG in an away Premier League game against Southampton 🤯
The Blues are breaking records 💥 pic.twitter.com/AsbYOnVe3K
— ESPN UK (@ESPNUK) December 5, 2024
Moving on to the team that inflicted the latest defeat on Southampton, Enzo Maresca’s Chelsea are riding a wave of positivity currently. It’s the first time in nearly three years that there’s no negativity surrounding the club and things seem to be going well. Maresca has got the team clicking and after their recent 5-1 win over Southampton, the Blues are sitting second in the league table, seven points adrift league leaders Liverpool. They have scored the most number of goals in the league till now and have conceded the third least amount of goals.
From now until the middle of March, the Blues only face two challenging games, with Spurs coming up this weekend and a trip to Manchester City in January. Rest all the games are against teams that are in the bottom half of the table and this presents an opportunity for the Blues to build on the current momentum. While Maresca himself as dismissed title talks, maintaining that the squad is young and all talks about winning the league is premature, if Chelsea keep this form up and Liverpool begin to drop points, they could emerge as title contenders. It would require a combination of things for this to become a reality but nobody even expected this from the London club when Maresca was appointed in the summer.
2) Manchester City finally return to winning ways
Man City get their first win since October.
Winless run ends at seven games 😮💨 pic.twitter.com/FaFdMjxASp
— B/R Football (@brfootball) December 4, 2024
It had been a difficult period for Manchester City and Pep Guardiola. The club found themselves in unchartered waters with a seven game winless run in all competitions. The defending champions had lost four league games in a row, something that the club hadn’t experienced in ages and something that Pep had never experienced in his career. After humiliating defeats to Bournemouth, Brighton, Tottenham, and Liverpool, all of which have hurt their chances of a record-extending fifth consecutive Premier League title, the club finally returned to winning ways.
The Cityzens, buoyed by the return of a fit Kevin De Bruyne into the starting lineup, thrashed Nottingham Forest 3-0 at home. De Bruyne, who was making only his fifth start of the season, bossed the game and the difference in the side was fully on display. The Belgian grabbed himself a goal and an assist with just a little over half an hour of the game being played, setting up the platform for his side’s first victory points October after they went the entire November without picking up a point.
1) Ruben Amorim tastes defeat after a year
Arsenal put an end to Ruben Amorim’s perfect start at Man United ❌ pic.twitter.com/x2pKrwrqZ3
— OneFootball (@OneFootball) December 4, 2024
Ruben Amorim travelled to Arsenal with his Manchester United squad for his first real test in the Premier League and it’s safe to say that it came a little earlier than he would’ve liked. Coming off the back of an uplifting and morale-boosting thrashing of Everton, the Red Devils were brought back down from that high by Mikel Arteta’s set piece specialists. Arsenal won the contest 2-0 but it wasn’t really a contest.
The defeat would sting Amorim even more so personally as it marked the first league defeat the Portuguese tasted in a year. Before joining Manchester United, Amorim started the season with Sporting on a winning streak and hadn’t lost with them in the league since December 2023. The 39-year-old had gone on a 34 game unbeaten run, winning 31 and drawing just three games before the defeat to Arsenal and has to start all over again now.
Another round of thrilling Premier League action comes to an end following last night’s games. Dive in to find out what we learned from the first midweek matchday of the season! Football Sports News: Latest Cricket News, Cricket Live Score, Sports Breaking News from Sports Today
