WHY SAY ANYTHING?

The weekend turned out to be a good one if you are from certain areas of London or Liverpool. Chelsea managed to overcome Hull City at the KC Stadium, while Tottenham Hotspur ended Manchester City’s 100% record.

Liverpool played badly, according to Jürgen Klopp, but still managed to beat Swansea at The Liberty Stadium.

On Friday, Everton had dropped two points in a disappointing 1-1 draw with Crystal Palace.

Meanwhile, in Manchester, United were handing a draw to Stoke City who gratefully accepted the gift.

The late game saw Burnley taking on Arsenal in Arsène Wenger’s 20-years-in-charge celebratory game. A game which Burnley were unfortunate to lose by the odd goal.

So, all-in-all, Liverpool, Arsenal and Tottenham have suddenly become the “teams to beat”. Whether they have sufficient stamina and squad depth to still be worthy of that title at the end of the season remains to be seen.

With Arsenal it is probably more a question of ambition than anything else. Will they be happy just qualifying for a tournament they never win or do they actually want to be champions in what should be Arsène Wenger’s final season in charge.

Amongst the early favourites, Manchester United and Chelsea look decidedly groggy. After a convincing 4-1 victory over the reigning champions United struggled to a 1-0 victory over Zorya Luhansk in midweek and Chelsea, having only won one of their previous four league games, hardly look like upcoming champions this time out.

We are about to find out how good Antonio Conte and Jose Mourinho really are.

The same can probably be said about Pep Guardiola who will not have been impressed with his City team in the 2-0 defeat to Spurs at White Hart Lane. Despite having four international full backs available to him none of them are particularly good and he will surely look to address this situation in January.

He also needs to consider his midfield options as Fernando looks slow and cumbersome and Navas is simply not good enough. Fernadinho is by far the stand out performer in that part of the pitch but he can’t do it all on his own and the results during the absence of Kevin De Bruyne show just what an important player he has become in such a short time.

With a bit of tinkering I would still expect City to be champions in May next year.

Jose Mourinho must be wondering how his team didn’t score five or six against Stoke but the problem with his players appeared to be one of attitude.

Unlike the game against Leicester where United were imposing themselves and forcing chances, they appeared not bothered when they missed one against Stoke, just assuming another one would come along at some time and they would win the match comfortably. Well, the chances did come along and they were unable to take them. It was an expensive two points dropped.

After all this there is still little to choose between the top seven teams. With City still top on 18 points Chelsea are seventh on 13. A difference of five points is a lot when there are only two games left but, at this stage of the season, it is very little and could change very quickly.

If only they would stop interrupting things with these pesky international breaks!