Where will 2023-24 season rank among Premier League's best title races?
As the race for the 2023-24 Premier League title rounds the final turn and heads for the home stretch, Arsenal, Liverpool and Manchester City look set to deliver an incredibly thrilling final two months of the season.
Heading into matchweek 30 this weekend, one point is all that separates the three sides, with Arsenal and Liverpool level on 64, and three-time defending champions (and still the bookmakers' favorites) Manchester City on 63.
But, where will it eventually rank among the best title races in the PL era?
3. 2013-14: Liverpool “slip” down the stretch of three-horse race with Man City, Chelsea
Just where we all hope the current campaign is headed a decade later, spring of 2014 saw three sides still mathematically in the hunt heading into matchweek 37, but only because of what had happened a week before. Liverpool (80 points) had the lead and a bit of breathing room to Chelsea (75) and Manchester City (74, plus a game in hand) with only three games left to play. Seven points from their final three games would have seen them go one clear of where Man City could reach. With title rivals Chelsea coming to Anfield to close out April, the formula was simple: a draw with Chelsea and victories over Crystal Palace and Newcastle would clinch Liverpool's first top-flight title since 1990.
Some combination of fate and the football gods had other ideas in mind, of course. Steven Gerrard, who just two weeks earlier rallied the team with those famous words — "This does not f***ing slip" — did, in fact, slip and Demba raced away to score the winning goal. A week later, Liverpool drew 3-3 away to Crystal Palace despite leading 3-0 after 78 minutes, and it was suddenly out of their hands. Chelsea kissed their own hopes goodbye a day earlier, drawing Norwich City 0-0 at Stamford Bridge. Man City, meanwhile, quietly went about their business and won their last five games to make it two titles in three seasons.
Final table
Man City - 86
Liverpool - 84
Chelsea - 82
2. 2018-19: Man City edge out Liverpool in runaway race 25 points clear of the field
Since the Premier League switched from 22 teams to 20 in 1995, four sides managed to win 97 or more points in a single season. 25 of 28 PL champions since 1995 won the title with fewer than 97 points. In 2018-19, Liverpool reached the 97-point mark, but came up against one of the other three sides to get within touching distance of triple digits. After matchweek 24, the Reds held a five-point advantage and wouldn't lose another game the rest of the way, though they did draw three.
Manchester City lost none, drew none and took 42 of 42 points available to close out the campaign, and they did so while conceding just four goals in 14 games, from the start of February onward. Since the infamous slip in 2014, Liverpool had finished 6th, 8th, 4th and 4th before finishing runners-up to City in 2019, thus it was the race of 2018-19 that marked the unofficial start of a brilliant rivalry coming to an end this year: Pep Guardiola's Manchester City vs Jurgen Klopp's Liverpool.
Final table
Man City - 98
Liverpool - 97
1. 2011-12: Sergio Aguero ends Man City’s 44-year drought in season’s final seconds
The ball hit the back of the net with 93:44 on the clock, on the final day of the season, with Manchester United players and coaches shuffling around the field at the Stadium of Light, hoping and perhaps thinking they had won the Premier League title. They done all they could do in a 1-0 victory over Sunderland. The Red Devils were in line to be champions when their game ended, but there were still a few minutes of stoppage time remaining back in Manchester.
We all know what happened next, but what some might not remember is that Man United actually held an eight-point lead with six games left to play that season. A loss to Wigan and a draw with Everton meant their advantage was just three points when they faced Man City in the third-to-last game of the season. Sergio Aguero's final-day heroics will be remembered forever, and for good reason, but it was Vincent Kompany's header two weeks earlier that flipped not only the top of the table, but — looking back on it now — English football for the foreseeable future.
Final table
Man City - 89 (+64 GD)
Man United - 89 (+56 GD)
“He’s won the league with 90 seconds of stoppage time to play. … It’s just the most extraordinary scenario you could have dreamt up.”
Well said, Peter Drury. Well said.
Will this season's epic title race end in similar fashion to all of the above — with sky blue ribbons adorning the iconic silver trophy — or will Liverpool finally come out on the right end of one of these all-time tales, or will Arsenal end a two-decade drought of their own and return to the summit of English football?
