A Fight To The Bitter End

There is just over one month left of the Premier League season, and the relegation battle continues to heat up and take all sorts of twists and turns. 3 teams will suffer relegation to the Championship.
If that wasn’t bad enough, now thanks to Sky and BT, they will also miss out on the millions of pounds that will come from the Premier Leagues new TV deal that kicks in this summer.
Already it is looking highly likely that 2 of those 3 teams will be Reading and Queens Park Rangers. The two southern based sides are not completely dead and buried, but continue to struggle in keeping up with the points totals of the teams above them. At the moment the final relegation spot is held by Wigan Athletic who have a game in hand on most of the sides above them and are also still going strong in the FA Cup.
What makes this battle to stay up even more interesting is that sides such as Stoke City and Sunderland who were looking a lot more comfortable one month ago are now in real danger of being dragged into the drop zone. Some people might disagree with me on this, but having looked at the remaining fixtures of all the teams in the Premier League, I would not rule out any of the teams in the lower half of the table being dragged further into relegation trouble before the season reaches its climax in May.
Having watched the Premier League for many years, I know as well as the next person how unpredictable and exciting this league can get. Given that the gap between 11th placed Southampton and 18th placed Wigan is just 6 points, to rule anyone in between and including those sides out of trouble would be absurd. For a team currently outside the bottom 3, all it takes is a loss in their next match, a win for the teams around and below them, an injury or suspension to a key player and they are in even deeper trouble than before. It makes for excellent entertainment for the neutrals such as myself, but does no favours to the nervous systems of the supporters whose clubs league future is in jeopardy.
I don’t doubt that every team will give their all for every remaining game to ensure a happy finish to the season. The toughest games will be against those chasing a top 4 finish and fellow relegation candidates. There is a chance that the best way for teams to pick up points could come from facing the teams in the top half of the table that will most likely just be playing for pride.
As we’ve seen in the past, teams can often go into summer holiday mode early when a European place is unachievable and there is no threat of relegation. But at the same time as this is one of the best leagues in the world, the standard will not be allowed to drop too much and the teams in trouble will still have to work their socks off to get the points needed to guarantee safe passage into next seasons Premier League.
This time last season, things at the bottom were completely different, the gap between 18th and 11th was a whopping 14 points, and while the battle to stay up lasted all the way until the final day of the season last year, it was overshadowed mainly by the dramatic way Manchester City won the Premier League title that day as well.
This time with the trophy looking most likely to go to Manchester United before the final day given the 12 point gap between them and City at the moment, more attention should then go to the bottom half of the table on the final day of the season, and if come that all important day on May 19th the majority of the teams in the bottom half are still fighting to stay up, it is going to make for another incredible end to the Premier League season.
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