Some people say that in the eighteenth round of the league, the top teams in the Premier League took a collective nap, and only the Manchester duo remained strong.
But by the nineteenth round, things had turned.
First, Liverpool defeated Newcastle 3-1 at home. Bellamy scored twice and Gerrard scored a goal.
Dalglish made a lot of rotations in the lineup, but Bellamy's outstanding performance allowed the Reds to score all three points from the Magpies.
Arsenal did not rotate significantly, but still relied on Robin van Persie's goal to narrowly beat Queens Park Rangers 1-0.
Regardless of whether it is the Red Army or Arsenal, after the boring draw in the previous round, although this round has some stumbles and even dangers, they at least got three points.
Only hapless Chelsea.
Since losing to Manchester City at home, Chelsea has had three consecutive draws, all of which were 1-1. Villas-Boas's team has been questioned, and his coaching position has been shaken again.
In the nineteenth round, Chelsea faced Aston Villa at home. This was originally a very good opportunity.
Drogba scored a goal for Chelsea in the 23rd minute, but no one expected that Aston Villa equalized the score just five minutes later.
After that, no matter how Chelsea attacked and occupied an overwhelming advantage, they were never able to break through Aston Villa's goal.
On the contrary, in the 83rd and 86th minutes, Petrov and substitute Darren Bent made two counterattacks, scoring two winning goals for Aston Villa and helping the team win the away game.
Defeated Chelsea 3-1.
After the game, Chelsea coach Villas-Boas attributed the defeat of this game to the unfair schedule, because Chelsea had to play the four Christmas games in 11 days, but Manchester United played in 15 days, including two games.
The difference is only forty-eight hours.
The British media reacted negatively to Villas-Boas's remarks, thinking that he was looking for reasons and excuses for losing.
The Premier League's Christmas schedule is not new this year. It has existed for so many years. It is also regarded as a tradition of English sports. It is not only football, but also other events such as rugby and baseball. It is also held during the Christmas period.
In games, even extra games, this is to better please the local fans in England.
As Chelsea's head coach, Villas-Boas has no reason not to know all this.
As for the schedule, Chelsea's game pressure is not the greatest. For example, Manchester City and Blue Moon have greater pressure than Chelsea.
"Boas has reason to think that the schedule is unfair to them, but if they blame the defeat on the schedule, it will only make others laugh, because compared with Manchester City, is Chelsea under greater pressure?"
"In the last three games, Chelsea has played two home games and one away game. One of the away games is an away game against Tottenham Hotspur, also in North London. They don't even need to leave London for these three games."
"What about Manchester City? The seventeenth round was at home, and the eighteenth and nineteenth rounds were both away games. They went south to Birmingham early in the morning on Boxing Day and challenged West Bromwich Albion away. After returning to Manchester, they
Head north non-stop to Sunderland, which is more than 200 kilometers away."
After Chelsea lost to Aston Villa, Manchester City's game against Sunderland has not yet started, but the media believes that even if Manchester City loses, the Christmas schedule will still be better than Chelsea.
In other words, when it comes to the schedule, Chelsea has an advantage over Manchester City, but the result is not as good as Manchester City. How do you say this?
In fact, Chelsea's ranking this season has never been ideal, and now it is always hovering between fifth and sixth. There is still no obvious gap between the top four expected by fans, and Villas-Boas has also been criticized by the outside world.
"The real problem at Chelsea is that Villas-Boas has lost control of the dressing room!"
The Daily Mail pointed out Chelsea's biggest problem very sharply.
This media reported in a large space, from when Villas-Boas came to power and had a grudge with Drogba, Lampard and Terry, to later having to re-employ Drogba and Terry, and now always suppressing Lampard, these
All of which caused Villas to lose the support of the locker room.
Shifting the blame to the schedule is just a delaying tactic by Villas-Boas.
…………
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On December 31st, in the 19th round of the Premier League, Manchester City challenged Sunderland away.
Manchester City rotated again, and this time even Su Dong was on the bench.
Guardiola arranged for Dzeko and Aguero to try to strengthen the team's offense and strive to win the Black Cat Sunderland away from home. He also arranged David Silva and Tony K in the midfield.
Ross is in charge.
Obviously, Guardiola still wants to win this game with a complete victory.
…
After the game started, Sunderland, who was playing at home, launched a wave of attacks, but was quickly suppressed by Manchester City.
With their skillful passing and ball control, Blue Moon quickly secured their advantage and frequently created opportunities in the midfield and frontcourt.
But it is paradoxical that both Dzeko and Aguero lost their shooting boots in this game.
Aguero's condition has not been very good since before Christmas. He is obviously adapting to the Premier League's Christmas schedule. After all, during this period, other leagues have already ushered in the winter break, but the Premier League does not have a winter break.
On the contrary, it is the period with the most intensive schedule, which many players really need to adapt to.
But Dzeko has only been in the team for a short period of time, and he was unable to adjust to his form this time.
As a result, Manchester City completely controlled the advantage on the field, but failed to score and repeatedly missed scoring opportunities.
Sunderland missed an excellent opportunity in the first half, which came from a counterattack. After Bendtner made a solo shot, he was saved by Courtois and failed to score.
In the second half, they were overwhelmed by Manchester City and couldn't even mount a decent counterattack.
Manchester City had the upper hand but could not score. The thunder was loud but the rain was small. The ball possession rate and the number of shots were very high, but they failed to score, which made many people worried.
This chapter is not over yet, please click on the next page to continue reading! At the 75th minute, Guardiola saw that the situation had not been reversed, and finally couldn't bear it anymore and replaced Su Dong.
In less than thirteen days, this is already Su Dong's fourth game.
In the previous three games, he was substituted early, but this time, the team did not originally intend to let Su Dong play. It was Su Dong who took the initiative to ask to be on the substitute list, just in case, but unexpectedly he was still on the bench after all.
.
Manchester City had the advantage, and Guardiola replaced Dzeko with Sudong, occupying absolute dominance in the penalty area.
Sunderland defended tenaciously and vowed to keep this point at home.
After the two sides fought for a few more minutes, at the 86th minute, Su Dong was in the penalty area, leaning on Wes Brown with his body, and then passed the ball back to Toni Kroos, who was at the top of the arc.
A push shot was deflected over the crossbar by Sunderland goalkeeper Mignolet and turned into a corner kick.
Then Manchester City took a corner kick, and David Luiz's header from close range hit the crossbar and bounced back into the penalty area. This made everyone surprised to find that tonight's Manchester City really didn't
Shooting boots.
But just as the ball was slowly falling, Su Dong in the penalty area squeezed O'Shea away with his body, blocked Wes Brown, turned his back to the direction of the attack, and stopped the ball firmly at his feet.
He tried to turn around, but was blocked by Wes Brown and O'Shea. Goalkeeper Mignolet also followed, ready to save at any time, but Su Dong suddenly knocked his heel.
The ball passed through the gap between the defensive players and slid towards the edge of the unguarded small penalty area.
David Silva quickly followed up and easily pushed the ball with his left foot.
The ball hit the net!
In an instant, the Stadium of Light, which was originally bustling with people, suddenly became silent.
Everyone couldn't believe it. After struggling for more than 80 minutes, the game was about to end. At this juncture, the ball was lost.
Isn't this a joke?
…
Manchester City finally defeated Sunderland 1-0 away with Su Dong assisting David Silva to score.
The process was full of advantages, but very dangerous. Fortunately, we finally got three precious points.
This allowed Manchester City to finally win nineteen consecutive games and win the half-way championship of this season's Premier League!
This is the first time in the history of the Premier League, England's top league, and even Europe's top leagues that a team has been able to win the half-way championship with a complete victory record. This was unimaginable in the past.
Everyone was also shocked by Manchester City's rapid rise.
In just three years, backed by the strong financial resources of the Abu Dhabi consortium, Guardiola's passing and ball control system, and Sudong's superhuman strength, Manchester City has become a force that cannot be ignored in European football.
Powerful.
At the same time that Manchester City struggled to defeat Sunderland 1-0 away from home, Manchester United was at home against Blackburn Rovers, who were at the bottom of the standings.
In this game, everyone originally thought that Manchester City's victory over their opponent was a sure thing.
On the one hand, Blackburn's strength is too poor, and on the other hand, Manchester United has defeated its opponents by five goals in the last two rounds, which is overwhelming. Comparing the two, Manchester United has no reason to lose points.
At the beginning of the game, it seemed to confirm the outside world's judgment that Manchester United had the advantage and the goal was just around the corner.
Unexpectedly, when defending a corner kick, Berbatov pulled down his opponent in the penalty area and was awarded a penalty kick. Yakub calmly took the penalty and scored a goal for Blackburn.
After changing sides in the second half, Yakub once again passed Carrick and Phil Jones on the outside of the penalty area, giving Blackburn another victory, 2-0!
By this time in the game, the atmosphere had completely changed.
Manchester United then launched a fierce attack and Berbatov scored two goals to successfully equalize the score.
But in the 80th minute of the game, there was another corner kick opportunity, and Blackburn defender Hanley scored the winning goal for Blackburn Rovers.
With Hanley's key goal, Blackburn defeated Manchester United 3-2 in the away game, causing the biggest upset in the Premier League this season.
Who would have thought that Manchester United, the Red Devils ranked second in the standings, would be upset by deputy captain Blackburn Rovers at their home stadium.
With these three points lost, the point gap with Manchester City has widened to 12 points, but this is not the key yet.
The point is, it didn't matter that they were defeated by Manchester City at home, but now they were beaten by the deputy squad leader. This was a serious blow to Manchester United's morale.
Ferguson was furious after the game and said he was very disappointed with the game.
The media also criticized Manchester United based on their previous propaganda, believing that the Premier League championship has lost its suspense.
