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Leicester City have won the Premier League. Leicester City.
I can’t believe I’ve just written that sentence. But it’s never an easy thing to do even with Eden Hazard, Alexis Sanchez or Sergio Aguero in your team. It’s one of the biggest ever stories in football, if not the biggest. Well done to them, and whatever my opinions on Leicester are, nobody can take this remarkable achievement away from them.
Saturday was the first away game I’ve been to this season where we didn’t get beat. I was at Leicester and West Brom and on both occasions we came away empty handed, so I guess I was slightly pleased we snatched a point.
Newcastle winning at the weekend didn’t help and although I know this conspiracy theory thing is rubbish it felt that way after former Magpie Yohan Cabaye missed a penalty. He chooses THAT game to miss one. However, that was a game I expected them to win, likewise I expect them to get a result at Aston Villa this weekend.
Thankfully Arsenal, unlike Crystal Palace, did their part of the bargain by beating Norwich, who aren’t out of this either. It is still in our hands but boy we are walking a rather dangerous tightrope that we expect to snap at any given minute.
I did mention before the game that Stoke would be tough opponents whatever happened in their last three matches before then. They conceded twelve goals in those three but they were against Liverpool, Tottenham and Manchester City. We are nowhere near as good as any of those teams, as much as I’d like us to be.
Yes the performance at Stoke was poor but I wouldn’t go as far as to call it rotten or disgraceful. I felt nerves just got the better of Sunderland in the second-half so, in that aspect, to come away from the game with a point must be big for them, especially with that equaliser coming with almost the last kick of the game. That point could be vital for us. Goal difference could still play a factor in it as well.
I am concerned about Newcastle’s form at the moment and I remember saying when we beat Norwich that the one bad thing about that is that it presents hope to Newcastle about staying up. However, if we get seven points out of our last three games we will finish above them and there’s a chance that will be enough to stay up.
Do I realistically think we’ll get seven points? No. Personally I think we’ll get four or five but whether that is enough to stay remains to be seen. Hopefully we stay up regardless of the points we receive in the last three matches.
Despite this being one of their worst seasons in recent memory, Chelsea will be a hard game and I struggle to see us taking much out of this one. Eden Hazard didn’t start on Monday against Spurs and as soon as he came on he made a big impact. That was against a Spurs side who were competing for the title!
He, like many of Chelsea’s players, has been awful this season but he’s still a world class player. Not just him either - Diego Costa, Oscar, Fabregas, Willian and Pedro to name a few; if we are to get a good result we must be on top of our game.
Norwich play Manchester United, who are still hopeful of securing a top-four finish, in the early kick-off so I suspect those at the Stadium of Light will be watching that game with massive interest. My slight hope at Villa Park is that the home team actually turn up for once.
I can’t believe we’re into the last two weeks of the season. It's straight forward - whatever happens, we need to better Norwich and Newcastle’s results. If we could go into the last two games out of the bottom three that’d be massive. But, if we go into the Everton game at least no worse off than we are now, I’d take that.
Come on Sunderland - let’s give ourselves a good platform going into the last week of the season.
