Chelsea Stays Top

On Friday, a friend of mine asked me "Who do you think 's going to win between Arsenal and Chelsea?" I said "Chelsea [...] Chelsea better win." He himself is a Chelsea fan, but did not really believe in Chelsea that much, maybe because of the results from last year, so he insisted to add to the discussion that Arsenal was playing at home.

So what?

What I don't believe, though, is that Arsenal could ever be a title contender anymore. (And I told my friend that, too.)
Yes, it's very early, but I would be ready to bet that Arsenal will not win the title this year. I also do not see them winning any of the upcoming couple of seasons, either, or even any later upcoming ones, also.
Arsenal... Tottenham... Newcastle... whatever...
If any of these teams should find themselves atop the table, for some duration, it is only because of an unbelievable streak of coincidences, and they will not, and can not, stay there in the long run.
The way these clubs are run is extremely faulty, from the standpoint of a true winner, and that's why you can exclude these teams as title contenders.
(Oh, and Liverpool?... Well, they should consider themselves lucky if they finish above Everton, Aston Villa and the like. So, I'm not even talking about Liverpool anymore. Champions League berths are beyond its capabilities.)

There are only three teams with real ambitions in the Premier League:
Manchester United, Chelsea (who have to still do a lot of work in rebuilding their team, in my opinion), and now, seemingly, Manchester City.
That's it.

No team that sells its best player willingly to (supposedly )its biggest rival - yes, I do mean van Persie, damn it! - is a team that should be made fun of. And it is not a team who has its heart set on competing against said rival.

But, getting back to Arsenal, I wasn't exactly impressed that they stole some points from Man. City, the previous matchday. But Arsenal, I guess, is going to spoil some things for some teams. Just like Everton. Or QPR, ha, ha, why not?
With that in mind, many congratulations to Chelsea for managing to avoid what City could not.
Maybe Mancini's squad will live to rue those dropped points against Wenger's men.

On the other hand, Arsenal made more errors in their match against Chelsea, than at the Etihad stadium. Torres (in minute 20) and Mata (53) managed to speculate some of those weaknesses, emphatically, and won the game for Di Matteo 's team, in spite of a spectacular effort from Gervinho (42) that pulled things level before half time.
Even so, Arsenal could have kept a point, if Giroud had done better with his shot at the death, after rounding Chelsea's goalkeeper.

But the most important fact is that, thanks to this impressive (- I guess -) win, Chelsea stays top. Let's hope they can maintain their rhythm, and for once offer an English-league title chase that involves more than just two teams, this year. (That would be nice.)

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