End of season top of the table predictions – post transfers edition. « Untold Arsenal: Arsenal News. 800,000 visits last month
By Phil Gregory
Following on from my last article looking at the summers movements and likely additions, I took the plunge and made some predictions for the top of the table come May. With the close of the transfer window and a couple of games under our belts, how much have things changed?
Well originally I plumped for (1st) City, United, Arsenal, Spurs, Chelsea, Newcastle, Liverpool to be the top seven come the end of the season.
From those, I feel the main changes are around Chelsea and Spurs. Our North London rivals had a bit of a summer of upheaval, and new manager Villas Boas is evidently still making his mark on his squad. Arry didn’t do a bad job, but he’s a “first eleven” manager, and only focuses on the here and now, so Villas-Boas inherited a somewhat disjointed squad with a strange age structure. That, and the departure of Modric, has posed some difficulties for Spurs, which I’m sure is truly upsetting to our readership here.
Chelsea on the other hand, have started strongly,with Hazard especially bright in the early games. I feel it’s foolish to change my position radically based on a few games; we’ve all seen teams start strongly in August, get hyped and then be nowhere near come May.
I still feel managerial uncertainty will unsettle Chelsea if they were to struggle at any point in the season, and Di Matteo’s inexperience makes that all the more likely. That said, they got a right back in so their defence looks quite a bit more solid and deeper, so it’s not outlandish to improve my prediction and tip them to come in fourth this season.
Some may argue that prediction is a bit on the low side, but I’d argue that those people are underestimating the amount of improvement Chelsea have to make. They came sixth last season, coming from that far back to win the title is simply not going to happen. Even if you bought an entirely new, world class squad it would take time for them to adapt: for some time the whole would be less than the sum of its parts. For me, an inexperienced manager who wasn’t the owner’s first choice, said owner clearly being heavily involved in the selection of transfer targets, and a few declining senior pro’s that have egos too big to be sidelined seems like a nice brew for a mid-season meltdown to me. Fourth would be a solid season.
Spurs on the other hand have started weakly, and look a little lost which is to be expected, given the to-ing and fro-ing that occurred this summer. As we have found, changing key personnel in attack can cost you some initial fluency, and this will come in time.
A season out of the top four wouldn’t be a disaster for Spurs, given they’ve improved the age profile of their team this year and may well have some Modric cash in the bank to further strengthen. Lloris for one looks like an astute buy, even if he doesn’t get into the team to begin with. Their lack of depth up front may have been dealt with too – if they play a single striker system, one of Defoe and Adebayor at a time should be enough to keep them going, if they get adequate support from the likes of Siggurdsson in behind.
One injury and it all begins to look a little light however. Not replacing Modric is a real blow though, and they will be reliant on Dembele for midfield creativity. 5th would be a solid season to build on, but another year below the Arsenal.
Most importantly for us however, is how things look for the Arsenal. I pinpointed in my early article that the defence could be much improved this year, and it has indeed been so thus far. Much of the praise for that has gone to Steve Bould’s appointment, but I feel that is simplistic. Bould was heavily involved with the Arsenal set-up prior to this summer – if he had something to offer the first eleven Wenger is open minded enough to take it on board.
I’m sure having a man with such a top level defensive background is only going to help the back four, but for me the improvement is down to a group of three excellent centrebacks benefiting from a pre-season of playing together to build the familiarity that was sometimes lacking last season, given injuries forced us to regularly chop and change at the back.
A solid back four, greater depth on the flanks (Podolski, Walcott, Gervinho, Chamberlain…) and greater creativity in the middle of the park thanks to Santi means that Arsenal could well be looking at an improvement this year compared to last. The car-crash start that was last season didn’t recur which is nice too. Sure, Giroud could do with scoring soon but goals will come given the solid back four and greater creativity. Oh, and did I not mention? Abou is BACK!
United and City… not much has changed. United have themselves a world class striker who is a country mile ahead of Rooney, but I still think City will prove themselves to be the team to beat. Newcastle are steady away and may find it tough being seen as a top side this time around, though they strengthened wisely (avoiding Carroll) and so should be in Europe.
Liverpool have the quality everywhere but up front, where Suarez couldn’t finish his dinner and Borini needs time. Keeping within touching distance of the top eight is key for them until the prospect of a January goalscorer.
All in all – not too much change. The Goons will kick on nicely this year, but will need a summer of stability in the squad before we can expect a real claim for the title. Walcott is expected to sign on at some point, so that just leaves Sagna, to my mind, who could possibly depart next summer – finally a bit of stability! A clear top three for me this year, with Chelsea likely to pull away from the Champions League pretenders below. I look forward to seeing just how wrong I am!
- City
- United
- Arsenal
- Chelsea
- Spurs
- Newcastle
- Liverpool
———————————