THE THRILLS & DISAPPOINTMENTS OF THE ENGLISH PREMIER LEAGUE

 

The drama of the English Premier League would never stop to confound its admirers seeing the listless moments of excitement, disappointments, and confusion each match brings. The introduction of VAR has further increased the level of suspense viewers are faced with in the English Premier League.

The past five years have been most remarkable and this has been an outcome of the stiff rivalry between clubs such as the acclaimed perennial winners of this half-decade, Manchester City, and Liverpool FC, strengthened by the managerial acumen of the now departing Jurgen Klopp and Mikel Arteta of Arsenal FC, a former assistant to Pep Guardiola, the architect of Manchester City's recent dominance.

As the 2023/24 English Premier League reaches its twilight, the fight between Man City and Arsenal FC remains fierce, and extraneous factors have caused a sudden decline of Jurgen Klopp's Liverpool FC. The sudden outbursts of the mercurial Mohammed Salah, at his coach's actions during their match against West Ham FC, revealed a possible crack in Liverpool's setup. It would remain a very painful end to the beautiful legacy that the German coach has built in these past eight years wherein he has won everything within England, including the European Champions League for Liverpool FC.

 

CAN ARTETA STOP GUARDIOLA?

These two teams are accelerating at the same speed towards the finish line and only the actions of spoiler teams striving to secure their positions within the English Premier League would determine who wins the league. These Spanish coaches have brilliantly managed their teams amidst the diverse vagaries of the English Premier League, such as injuries and loss of form of their players, unfavorable VAR decisions, and surprise defeats by opposition teams. Their consistency shows the quality of their coaching skills and unlike a team such as Tottenham Hotspur FC, who dazzled the English Premier League in their first ten matches but fell apart thereafter possibly resulting from some mediocre coaching and poor mentality from the players, Arsenal and Manchester City FC, both represent a perfectly better level of team strength.

 

 

 

WHO REPLACES KLOPP?

Liverpool FC has virtually confirmed Dutch coach Arne Slot, as a replacement for Jurgen Klopp but it's too early to call if he'd be able to immediately keep Liverpool at their current level of being amongst the best 3 teams of the English Premier League for more than five years. Whilst we wait to see how well he maintains this consistency, the superlative performances of Unai Emery's Aston Villa FC cannot go unnoticed. In his first season, he took them to get the European Conference League ticket, and currently, they have a firm grip over the fourth position in the English Premier League. With this level of consistency, the likelihood of maintaining this position looks strong and it would be the right decision to get the best backing from his board, anything otherwise would be calling for trouble!

 

THE BOTTOM TEAMS

The struggle here has been very fierce though Sheffield United FC confirmed their relegation last weekend and the battle for the other two spaces continues between Luton Town, Nottingham Forest, and Burnley. Despite the point deductions against them, Everton FC has overcome relegation and gliding on safe ground, whilst Nottingham Forest who faced the same fate as Everton FC is in dire waters.

When the English Premier League ends next month, there will be so much thrills, excitement, and disappointment about how the 2023/24 season went and the next focus will be on what to expect in the next season and how to make VAR a less disruptive factor in the determination of match results.