Football sports tablog

English Premier League Fight to the Finish

Friday, 12 March 2010 - Philip Hale

Manchester United’s pursuit of their 19th Championship, thereby moving ahead of Liverpool as England’s most successful club, and Chelsea’s latest attempt to deliver Roman Abramovich the success he demands have garnered most of the attention this season. Meanwhile at the Emirates, yet to witness a league title celebration, Arsenal have been quietly plugging away. With 9 games to go they are sitting on the shoulder of the leaders, poised to exploit a potentially easier run-in then either of their rivals, and ghost to the top prize. 

The first of those 9 games comes at Hull City’s KC stadium on Saturday. Phil Brown’s side is in a relegation scrap and a poor run of form that saw them thumped 5-1 by Everton last weekend. Having avoided relegation last season on the final day of the season, Hull will be keen to begin accumulating points but it is difficult to see them starting in this fixture. They have lost their last three games conceding 9 goals in the process while managing only one themselves. They come up against a free-scoring Arsenal side that have hit the net 11 times in their last three outings including the midweek 5-0 rout of Porto in the Champions League. 

Arsenal have shown resilience of late, putting together a four match winning run following what many considered title hope destroying back to back defeats by Man Utd and Chelsea. They have also shown mental strength with their reaction to Aaron Ramsey’s sickening injury against Stoke, using it as a boost to squad togetherness that is crucial in these nerve-jingling ends of season title races.  

Hull’s best bet will be to work hard against Arsenal’s superior quality and they can take some consolation that the fixture is at home where they have recorded their five victories this season. They have failed to win on their travels since March 4th of 2009. Arsenal meanwhile has lost four times on the road so Arsene Wenger will no doubt be warning against complacency. He will also be keen to see his players avoid the temptation to get involved in the kind of brawl that marred this fixture at the Emirates in December, a melee that saw both clubs fined for failing to control their players.  

With United and Chelsea due to meet on April 3rd the Gunner’s coach will see three points in this game as crucial in maintaining pressure on the leaders but also positioning his team to take advantage of at least one of their rivals dropping points in that fixture. With only two points separating the top three, Arsenal could leapfrog United who play Fulham on Sunday and, should Chelsea fail to beat West Ham, go top for at least 24 hours. This promises to be a fascinating fight for the first prize.