An historical reflection of the Premier League season

Kristian Jack

TSN Soccer Analyst

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It was a remarkable season that crowned an extraordinary champion. Listed as relegation candidates by most at the start of the season, Leicester and their new manager Claudio Ranieri captured the imaginations of football fans worldwide as their fairytale campaign lasted from start to finish. It was the 14^th Premier League season in a row where the team with the best home record became champions but the Foxes did their damage everywhere, securing more points than anyone else on their travels, achieving memorable wins at Tottenham and Manchester City at the start of 2016 that got many people believing they could actually win it all. They didn’t just win it, they crushed the rest, losing just three games and finishing 10 points clear.

Continuity over rotation

Managers often refer to a star player as ‘the first name on the team sheet’ but Ranieri had eleven of them for Leicester. From the middle of January at Aston Villa to the middle of April, when Jamie Vardy was sent off against West Ham, the Italian boss named the same starting XI in 11 of 13 games. Through 34 games he had made a staggeringly low 25 changes to his starting XI all season. As they got closer to the finish line suspensions caught up with them (Jamie Vardy, Danny Drinkwater, Robert Huth) and their most frequent XI could no longer be used in the final four games but the combined starts of their ten outfield players still beat Chelsea’s last season which at the time was considered a true statistical outlier.

Leicester’s super seven

Riyad Mahrez, PFA Player of the Year, and Jamie Vardy, Football Writers’ Player of the Year, deserved their plaudits but Leicester were equally as magnificent without the ball, defending as a unit and exploding at pace in the transition game. N’Golo Kante only started one of the first five games and Danny Simpson missed the first seven but slowly Ranieri found a consistency with his team as a defensive unit.

Goalkeeper Kasper Schmeichel, the back four of Danny Simpson, Robert Huth, Wes Morgan and Christian Fuchs with a central midfield pair of N’Golo Kante and Danny Drinkwater were Ranieri’s trusted seven players (in a 4-2-3-1) behind the four attackers.

Leicester’s record when all seven started together: Played 24, won 17, drew six, lost one – 2.3 Points Per Game.

The only game they lost came at Arsenal and they were winning 1-0 when Simpson was sent off. Without the seven together, they lost 2-1.

Leicester’s record when all seven didn’t start together: Played 14, won seven, drew five, lost two – 1.8 Points Per Game.

In total Leicester played 3,420 official minutes of this Premier League season.

Their super seven played 1,986 together, ended the moment Drinkwater was sent off at Old Trafford in game number 36. That works out to 68% of the season. In total when the seven were on the field together they conceded just nine goals! It is even more astonishing when you look closer at the nine goals:

Southampton (a) – Jose Fonte (corner)
Southampton (a) – Virgil Van Dijk (corner)
Watford (h) – Troy Deeney (penalty)
Man Utd (h) – Bastian Schweinsteiger (corner)
Aston Villa (a) – Rudy Gestede (handled the ball before scoring - missed by referee)
Man City (a) – Sergio Aguero (2nd phase from a corner, was offside – missed by referee)
West Ham (h) – Andy Carroll (penalty)
West Ham (h) – Aaron Cresswell (30 yard half volley)
Man Utd (a) – Anthony Martial.

It took until the final month for a team to score a legitimate goal from open play against this seven and Cresswell’s goal was magnificent and would have beaten any team. The only real time the seven was truly opened up was at Old Trafford when, knowing a win secured the league, they looked nervous early and Simpson lost Martial at the back post.

Remarkably, Leicester conceded just nine goals in the 68% of the season when the seven were together – or one goal every 220 minutes. When they had to rely on others to play the other 32% they conceded 27 goals – one goal every 53 minutes.

Champions League positions: Arsenal, Tottenham Hotspur, Manchester City

For Arsenal it was much of the same. The win over Leicester on Valentine’s Day put them two points back with 12 to play until they sputtered towards the finish line again. In a year where many other big-money giants failed this will forever be looked at as a real missed opportunity for Arsenal fans.

The future of Arsene Wenger continues to split the fan base but no one can agree that their final points total of 71 is what a squad of that calibre should be achieving. Alexis Sanchez, Mesut Ozil, Aaron Ramsey, Laurent Koscielny, Petr Cech, Nacho Monreal and Hector Bellerin all played at least 30 games each and yet the club still didn’t look like getting close to 80 points. In the eleven years prior to this, since they last won the league, their final tally was an average of 73.9. In nine of their last ten seasons they have finished with a total between 68 and 79 points, enough to celebrate Champions League football the following year but not close enough to being a true Premier League contender.

It is now eight years running that they have finished more than six points behind the eventual champion. Nowhere near good enough. That should ultimately be the final thought for everyone associated with such a massive club, not the fact that they finished above their rivals because they crumbled once their title push came to an end. At least they had a title push.

Project Pochettino truly took off in the manager’s second year in charge at White Hart Lane and the league was better for the challenge they provided Leicester. For seven-and-a-half months from the start of September to the middle of April they were just as good as the champions, as both teams earned 65pts from games 5-34. Toby Alderweireld was the league’s best defender all season and an English trio completed a wonderful spine as Eric Dier, Dele Alli and Harry Kane all had magnificent seasons. Tottenham failed to win any of their first four and their last four but Mauricio Pochettino has assembled one of the finest young squads in European football and crucially showed the team can compete at a time when stars like Kane, Christian Eriksen and Hugo Lloris could easily have been temped elsewhere this summer if Champions League football was not a reality.

Manchester City qualified for the Champions League, reached the last four of the competition this season and won the league cup but it was a poor year for the blue half of Manchester. The club has some brilliant players who can win games by themselves but they have far too many players not good enough for what they want to be. They are a team without an identity, still searching for commanding defenders and midfielders who can control games. Last season they headed into the final month out of contention on 61pts through 32 games and this season the only thing that was different was their points total (60pts). That is a real indictment on everyone at the club, many of who need to be moved on. Much work for Pep Guardiola to do.

Europa League positions: Southampton, Manchester United

Ronald Koeman’s team won their last four to ensure qualification for Europe and show progress from the past two seasons when they finished eighth and seventh. Throughout that rise they have continued to sell and sign smartly and with an outstanding youth academy the club have never been in a better state. They have been firm in not allowing key men to leave at key times. That stance may well be tested with Koeman himself this summer.

It was supposed to be a season of progress for Manchester United. Finally Louis Van Gaal was given a full pre-season with the squad and previous issues looked to have been addressed with over 80 million pounds spent on Morgan Schneiderlin, Bastian Schweinsteiger, Memphis Depay and Matteo Darmian. Instead, United went backwards. A late push for the Champions League spot left some thinking positive about them but in truth this global football brand are miles away from the success they should demand. The future of the manager continues to be the biggest story around the club but an entirely different approach is needed in terms of recruitment. United have been evaluating players poorly for far too long and they need to act fast and buy better quickly before the true standards of what it takes to play for this club are lost.

Relegated: Newcastle United, Norwich City, Aston Villa

Three teams nowhere near good enough. One team – Norwich - has a bright young manager, didn’t spend beyond their means but struggled to find a player who could score regularly in the Premier League. Much like two years ago, they leave the Premier League in good state and will likely contend to be back next season. Harder to predict are the futures of two big clubs that have been run poorly for far too long. Managers came and went but ultimately the blame lay at the feet of the players and those who recruited them. Newcastle even hired a great manager in Rafa Benitez and still couldn’t beat Sunderland, Norwich or Aston Villa while he was there. Villa leave the Premier League for the first time with the entire club in disarray. It was arguably the worst performance by any club since the league was rebranded in 1992.

My top 10 goals of the season:

10 Eden Hazard - Chelsea vs Tottenham
9 Anthony Martial - Man Utd vs Liverpool
8 Riyad Mahrez - Leicester vs Chelsea
7 Christian Benteke - Liverpool vs Man Utd
6 Matt Ritchie - Bournemouth vs Sunderland
5 Harry Kane - Tottenham vs Arsenal
4 Cuco Martina - Southampton vs Arsenal
3 Jamie Vardy - Leicester vs Liverpool
2 Dimitri Payet - West Ham vs Palace
1 Dele Alli - Tottenham vs Palace

Manager of the season – Claudio Ranieri

Player of the season – Riyad Mahrez

My team of the season: David De Gea (Man Utd); Hector Bellerin (Arsenal), Toby Alderweireld (Tottenham), Wes Morgan (Leicester), Nacho Monreal (Arsenal); Riyad Mahrez (Leicester), N’Golo Kante (Leicester), Dele Alli (Tottenham), Dimitri Payet (West Ham); Jamie Vardy (Leicester), Harry Kane (Tottenham).