The race to finish in the top four 2017/18

Sideshow Bob

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United will be five points clear of fourth place Liverpool if Liverpool beat Swansea.
 
Don’t think we need to worry about this just yet. Still a ways to go for the season to end. So I ain’t throwing the towel in for the title race yet. Might be highly optimistic of me. But that’s just me.
 
Title race is over for me. I know it's early in the season to say that, but this freak of a season that City have had has left the chasing pack with far to much to do.

What worries me the most is just how out of form we are. Those narrow wins against the lesser sides. That league cup exit to Bristol. Not killing off Leicester. Then fighting back to draw against Burnley at home. It's not all bad luck. There's something more to it then that. It's like we switched off after the City loss and we haven't been able to recover.

We've dropped players. We've played players in different roles. We've played 3 at the back. 4 at the back. Matic at the back. All equals poor performances. It's not fluid. And It's not happening for us.

He needs to go get someone else in January. Just to freshen it up as much as anything. Try give us another option because something is missing.
 
Title has been gone for a while but top 3 is still in our control, the target now should be 2nd and close the gap as much as possible to City.

Going from 6th to 2nd would be a big jump and start a fresh next season hopefully with a bit more quality added as we know that to win the title now you require near perfection.
 
Yeah league is done, all about keeping ahead of the chasing pack, go all out for the FA Cup and obviously over two legs in the Champions League you never know, still plenty to play for just the league has been crazy this year, have to hold your hands up and just say fair play to City but as @jsp said, a jump from 6th to 2nd plus hopefully at the very least Champions League quarters and maybe more.

Another 3 or 4 big signings in the summer and we can rock into next season.
 
On the radio yesterday they wrote united out of the top 4. Unbelievable.
 
On the radio yesterday they wrote united out of the top 4. Unbelievable.

I think we are now in a 5 team fight for 4 spots because of those 3 draws but to write us off is crazy talk but I feel we need to reinforce in January to make sure.

Injuries are piling up again and it’s a big problem as it means we have to keep changing our starting XI so no settled line up and it also makes it almost impossible for him to rotate and keep people fresh as he’s constantly having to put out fires because he loses another player.
 
Injuries are piling up again and it’s a big problem as it means we have to keep changing our starting XI so no settled line up and it also makes it almost impossible for him to rotate and keep people fresh as he’s constantly having to put out fires because he loses another player.

Doesn’t every team have this problem?
 
Doesn’t every team have this problem?

Not sure City have had the issues we’ve had and I think it’s why they’ve run away with it like Chelsea did last season they’ve found a rhythm and never really looked back.

I agree the others have all suffered and that might explain the massive gap but that’s why I think it’s a 5 team race for 3 spots. With the start we made I’d be gutted if we fell below 3rd which would be our best league finish in 5 years.
 
If we can continue to play as we did in the second half against Everton, we'll hold second place comfortably. That's a big 'if' though.
 
If we can continue to play as we did in the second half against Everton, we'll hold second place comfortably. That's a big 'if' though.

I think that and the performance vs Derby were really positive the team looked happy, hungry, relentless and maybe more importantly together whereas over Xmas it seemed like they’d run out of steam a bit and weren’t all pulling together. I think the manager can take credit for that since his press conference he’s now portraying a happier focused Mourinho like whatever was bothering him isn’t anymore and he’s raised the mood around the place which is what great managers do.

Nice little break now to rest the legs and because Stoke lost that means our next league game remains on Monday night so they’re off to Dubai for a few days of warm weather training which will hopefully help keep spirits high.
 
Away to Spurs in the league next a big chance to deal them a potential knockout blow if we can get a win at Wembley.
 
After 24 games

Team Points GD

Man City 65 +52
Man Utd 53 +33
Chelsea 50 +29
Liverpool 47 +25
Spurs 45 +25
Arsenal 42 +14

I'm always reluctant to rule teams out as teams all the teams below City have shown they can suddenly hit a rut for 3 or 4 games and drop a lot of points, Utd in December allowed the chasing pack to close up behind us by drawing games.
 
So glad Liverpool dropped 3 points last night, could do with Chelsea dropping 3 as well to give us some breathing space. I wonder what our goal difference was at this point in the season for the last 3 campaigns before this. I'd bet nowhere near as good as this season.
It looks like it could be a close run in to be honest. I'm hoping Sanchez has a galvanising effect with us that will lift us to the end of the season and we finish 2nd as I can't see City dropping 12 points but you just never know.
 
I'm hoping Sanchez has a galvanising effect with us that will lift us to the end of the season and we finish 2nd as I can't see City dropping 12 points but you just never know.

CL final, Sanchez, 90th minute winner vs City :)

Just to rub in the signing and make up for the last minute title win
 
Premier League: Liverpool 2-2 Tottenham Hotspur - 4th February 2018

United are now 7 points clear of 5th placed Spurs.
 
Are we still in a race?? I mean we and city are nailed on to finish in the top 4 barring a spectacular collapse.
 
Are we still in a race?? I mean we and city are nailed on to finish in the top 4 barring a spectacular collapse.

I think it’s still a race. 7 points can disappear so quickly in this league. I don’t think we are a better side than Liverpool, Chelsea & Spurs but we probably have better strength in depth than them to handle injuries plus the way we play is less physically taxing.

We are in pole position but this side is still one I don’t trust. What is good is this season we are looking much better against the middle/bottom teams, we aren’t dropping to many silly points against these teams this season.

Liverpool, Arsenal & Chelsea all at home need to hit a few knockout blows in those games and that should see us home.
 
I would have preferred a Liverpool win......................................................sorry about the delay I was clearing the vomit out my throat, to put Spurs out of it really.

It's not over yet for sure, be interesting to see Chelsea tonight as they seem to be imploding.
 
Chelsea have got some big problems at the back Christensen isn't fit and Luiz has hardly played all season but they probably need him to come back in and Cahill is really struggling as well.

Be interesting to see if Giroud starts for them tonight as he could be a great partner for Hazard up top.

Think the issue for Chelsea has been the change from 3-4-3 to 3-5-2 the extra man in midfield has taken away some of that edge up top.
 
Crazy how we lost Wed night but a few days later with other games happening we've got a 5 point gap to 3rd! We're riding this by the seat of our pants but we're in 2nd because no other team can get any consistency too.
 
That's the thing, everyone is raving about Liverpool and Spurs but there 4th and 5th, its all good and well pressing and having this flowing attacking football but if one of them miss out on top 4, does it really matter.

Although saying that, I personally think Chelsea will miss out, dunno what's going on there.
 
That's the thing, everyone is raving about Liverpool and Spurs but there 4th and 5th, its all good and well pressing and having this flowing attacking football but if one of them miss out on top 4, does it really matter.

Although saying that, I personally think Chelsea will miss out, dunno what's going on there.

Think the strain of a European calender plus cup progress has caught up to them this season, they weakened their starting XI in the summer no doubt losing Matic & Costa for Bakayoko & Morata has made their best XI weaker not stronger.

They got to the League Cup semi (think they went out quite early last season) and also had 6 CL games to play in a group that went right to the wire so all that extra rest they had last season was gone and as a result players are picking up injuries.

They have added a lot of players to the squad this season but not sure it's really added quality to them so far none the 2 starters don't look better than the guys they've replaced and the squad players aren't contributing a huge amount.

They've also gone to a more defensive system in 3-5-2 than the 3-4-3 that they'd really mastered last season that system ripped the league apart last season as no one could work out how to pick up Hazard & Pedro in those inside forward roles Utd basically man marked them in the game we played later in the season.
 
I couldn't believe it when I saw the score between them and Bournemouth on Wednesday night, I thought it was a misprint. That's a shocking result. We've got them at the end of the month though.
 
I couldn't believe it when I saw the score between them and Bournemouth on Wednesday night, I thought it was a misprint. That's a shocking result. We've got them at the end of the month though.

Yeah Christensen went off injured after 30 minutes and Bournemouth him them with a couple of quick goals and they never really looked back.
 
Premier League: Tottenham Hotspur 1-0 Arsenal - 10th February 2018

Are Arsenal out of the race following today's result?
 
I think if Liverpool & Chelsea win their games this weekend then it's over I think as I can't see two teams falling away.

Something like 3 wins away from home all season for Arsenal isn't good enough to make up 6 points in 11 games they probably need to be near perfect I think the only thing they have in their advantage is they've played most of the big boys home and away now. They've done Liverpool, Spurs & Chelsea home and away think they've got City at home and Utd away while that means they've got easy games to play it also means they don't have the chance to pull teams above them back close to them as they don't have the games against them.

They played ok first half game was pretty even but Spurs ripped them apart for 30 minutes in the 2nd half and really should've battered them.
 
I think if Liverpool & Chelsea win their games this weekend then it's over I think as I can't see two teams falling away.

Something like 3 wins away from home all season for Arsenal isn't good enough to make up 6 points in 11 games they probably need to be near perfect I think the only thing they have in their advantage is they've played most of the big boys home and away now. They've done Liverpool, Spurs & Chelsea home and away think they've got City at home and Utd away while that means they've got easy games to play it also means they don't have the chance to pull teams above them back close to them as they don't have the games against them.

They played ok first half game was pretty even but Spurs ripped them apart for 30 minutes in the 2nd half and really should've battered them.

Which game did you watch? They were camped out in their own half during the whole of the first half. With spurs having the majority of the possession and the opportunities. Though none of them were clear cut enough.
 
The way things are at the moment I think it’s a case of pick your order between us Liverpool and Spurs
 
Which game did you watch? They were camped out in their own half during the whole of the first half. With spurs having the majority of the possession and the opportunities. Though none of them were clear cut enough.

Watched it live Spurs created one good chance the Kane header lots of possession but nothing to really show for it, Arsenal looked dangerous on the break but Mkhitaryan wasted a couple of crossing chances and a very tight offside went against them.

Almost from kick off Spurs ripped them a new one 2nd half and it could and should have been 3 of 4
 
United are now six points ahead of fifth placed Chelsea, who have played one less game.
 
Chelsea win their next two games and Utd could be 5th by the end of Feb.

That home game to Chelsea really is must win now we’ve got to make sure our rivals don’t come to old Trafford and take points.
 

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