Sport
Victory over Tottenham Hotspur on Tuesday night would put Manchester City on the brink of Premier League history. No team has ever won four successive titles in the Premier League era, but Pep Guardiola’s team are just two games away from rewriting English football’s history books. They appear unstoppable.
This season has been a challenging one for City. There was a point in the campaign at which it seemed Arsenal and Liverpool might finish above them, but Guardiola and his players upped the pace in a way nobody else could keep up with. Manchester City are well-positioned to finish first in yet another title race.
With this achievement, a new precedent would be set at the top of English football. A fourth title in-a-row would make Manchester City the greatest team in Premier League history, putting them ahead of Sir Alex Ferguson’s Manchester United, Arsene Wenger’s Arsenal, Jose Mourinho’s Chelsea and the rest.
Guardiola has changed the landscape at the top of English football. The bar has never been higher for a team to win a Premier League title than it is now. Liverpool, for example, achieved a points tally of 97, the third-highest tally in Premier League history in the 2018/19 season and still didn’t finish ahead of City.
Arsenal will finish with their highest points tally since the Invincible season of 2003/04 and yet it’s likely they will still come second. It used to be the case that 80 points or more would put a team in title contention, but 90 to 100 points is now the requirement to finish top of the pile in the Premier League at this moment in time.
Some will point to Manchester City’s resources as a club to explain this. It’s certainly true that the Etihad Stadium club have spent big to attract some of the best players in the world in recent times – see Erling Haaland who is reportedly the highest-paid player in the Premier League on £865,000-a-week.
However, Guardiola is the reason for City’s dominance such is the level of control his ideology gives his team. Opponents might be able to harm the Premier League defending champions on the break, but it’s unlikely they will be able to create enough counter-attacking opportunities to get the better of them.
In the first half of this season, Guardiola had to integrate Josko Gvardiol and absorb the loss of Ilkay Gundogan to Barcelona. City were in a state of flux, but things have settled over the past couple months. Haaland is fit and firing again while Phil Foden is enjoying the best season of his career.
“We know how difficult it is to be in this position again but we have something unique in front of us,” Guardiola said ahead of Tuesday’s game away to Tottenham Hotspur which will have a big bearing on the Premier League title race with just two fixtures left of the 2023/24 campaign left to play.
“We have to read exactly the game we want to play and interpret it as best we can. The right tension and focus has to be there. If you play these games too relaxed, it’s a big problem. Tottenham are playing for the Champions League so they have a huge target but we have a huge target too.”
Last season saw Manchester City win an historic Treble. They swept all before them in English and European football, lifting the Champions League trophy for the first time in the club’s history. However, this season’s Premier League triumph could be the thing that confirms City as an era-defining force.
