Premier League winners and losers: Man City, Arteta, Leeds, Rosenior, Watkins, Howe | OneFootball

Eddie Howe and Liam Rosenior are in a race to walk or be pushed before the season ends, while Arsenal need to start speaking for Mikel Arteta.

It was a transformative weekend for the Premier League title race, European fight and relegation battle.

And it was bloody huge for Haiti, too.

Manchester City

Despite having literally dropped points both three and four games ago, Manchester City have reached that April flow state in which they never look like failing to win again.

Six victories to see out a ridiculous title charge would be among the least surprising outcomes from the rest of the season.

And as Pep Guardiola said after a Ferguson record-equalling fourth win over league leaders as the side in second, “momentum shifts in one instance”.

But it belong so tangibly to Manchester City now. Do go read 16 Conclusions.

Morgan Gibbs-White

That felt quite Luis Suarez. The Uruguayan’s hat-trick at home to relegation-adjacent West Brom in a 4-1 win in October 2013, to be exact, down to the minutiae of an absurdly good header in a finishing masterclass.

Gibbs-White has dragged Forest to probable Premier League safety and a Europa League semi-final; there have been few better relegation run-in heroes.

Georginio Rutter

Finally a Leeds hero in the Premier League. That £150m Real Madrid move will come soon.

Leeds

It matters not necessarily how much you spend, but how you spend it. With Premier League safety almost confirmed alongside a place in the FA Cup semi-final, Leeds can look back on their summer recruitment with immense pride.

There were few questions over the goalkeeper, defence and midfield signings, as all frustrations were channelled into what Daniel Farke himself said was a lack of “firepower”.

Yet there Leeds are, outscoring seven teams and matching Spurs for goals, with two of their three top scorers joining as free agents and the other, Noah Okafor, in scintillating form worth more than his £16.4m fee.

Leeds’ cost per goal is already the lowest in the league when taking the entire squad into account; factor in only the actual scorers and no team would come close.

Freddie Woodman

“I trained hard all season, didn’t think it would come, but yeah, obviously amazing to do it in a Merseyside derby and then to win it like we did was unbelievable,” said the third-choice keeper forced to do what no third-choice keeper should: play.

Arne Slot will desperately hope that Woodman takes his rightful place next to Patrice Luzi and Vitezslav Jaros in the veritable pantheon of Liverpool keepers whose Premier League careers consisted of no more than half an hour but also included never conceding.

Bournemouth

It is difficult to envisage Marco Rose being as successful as Andoni Iraola, but then if any club can be trusted with a succession plan it’s Bournemouth.

Their latest win over Newcastle provided compelling proof of their ability to absorb and even embrace player departures.

Adrien Truffert became the latest St James’ Park-visiting left-back goalscorer after Charlie Daniels and Milos Kerkez. James Hill has arguably outperformed £100m pair Dean Huijsen and Illia Zabarnyi at centre-half. Rayan has seamlessly stepped into Antoine Semenyo’s influential wide forward role.

Some deeply insecure teams fear the ‘selling club’ tag but Bournemouth have turned it into an enduring strength.

Iraola is central to that and it could well be that the process falters somewhat without him at its heart. But either way, Bournemouth embarking on an unbeaten Premier League run longer than anything all but 11 clubs have ever put together, in these circumstances, is an astonishing achievement.

They really ought to close out European qualification from here as the perfect end to Iraola’s transformative reign.

Ollie Watkins

The statistic about Watkins becoming only the second player – behind Sadio Mane – to reach double figures for goals in each Premier League season he has played is remarkable, considering the calibre of forwards to have graced the top flight in that time.

Even in perhaps his worst individual campaign since joining Aston Villa, Watkins has persevered and come alive with seven goals and two assists in his last eight games; he had seven goals and one assist in 31 appearances before then.

Tammy Abraham citing the constant movement and awareness of his team-mate in the box after scoring the winner against Sunderland shows just how influential Watkins remains to this team.

Manchester United

We are all guilty of falling into the trap of instinctively thinking a player performing a makeshift role will automatically be – forgive the language – a disaster.

The opposite is often true: it turns out that intelligent, gifted athletes can actually fulfil a different function with proper coaching.

While the natural reaction to seeing a centre-half pairing of Ayden Heaven and Noussair Mazraoui might be panic, it did both players a disservice. Heaven has shown more than enough to earn such trust, while Mazraoui has been used as a sodding 10 before at Manchester United so shifting across from the right into the middle was nothing.

“I have to give the coaching staff a lot of credit on getting the boys ready for that,” said Michael Carrick, who extolled the virtue of “meetings and video sessions and showing trust”.

If the loss of so many defenders simultaneously represented a crisis, it was impeccable management that helped Manchester United ease through – and, far more importantly, make Alejandro Garnacho look silly.

Xavi Simons

“He has to score, he has to make assists and he has to run without the ball,” said Roberto De Zerbi of Simons in his pre-match press conference.

The Dutchman cannot be accused of ignoring his manager’s instructions. That match-winning turn went up in flames but did still help underline how De Zerbi has the ear of this broken squad.

If Spurs truly are to complete Arsenal’s misery by putting together the least likely and most impressive five-game winning run in Premier League history, they will need more Simons magic.

Wilson Isidor

The joint-highest Haitian scorer in Premier League history, quite absurdly alongside Jean-Ricner Bellegarde.

Premier League losers

Mikel Arteta

Under no circumstances should you, as the league leaders attempting to hold off Manchester City in a title race, say that “we’re going to go again, that’s for sure”. It’s like, How Not To Bottle 101.

If he spends the build up to the Newcastle game talking about how this does not slip then we might as well call it there and then.

The damage, as in their previous failed title tilts, was done long before the closing months; the draw with Wolves in February carries particular regret, as should that run of two points against Liverpool, Nottingham Forest and Manchester United in January.

But this was – forgive the language – a disaster of a result, even if the performance was much better. Arsenal just need to start speaking for Arteta rather than the other way around.

Liam Rosenior

It is a point worth reiterating: how a manager on a contract until 2032 can be so tactically humiliated by one whose terms ostensibly only run for one more month is absurd.

Rosenior has rarely if ever felt like the right sort of fit for Chelsea, and Behdad Eghbali’s “I think we’re behind Liam” vote of confidence before the defeat to a Manchester United side with roughly one actual centre-half was laughable.

If Rosenior makes it to the end of the year in charge, all manner of hats ought to be eaten. After four consecutive defeats – all goalless for the first time in 28 Premier League years for Chelsea – it would be a mild surprise if he sees out the season.

Eddie Howe

He is right: Newcastle have “become too easy to beat”. Their 15 defeats in the Premier League is already the most the Magpies have suffered in a full season under Howe, with 18 Steve Bruce’s worst effort.

The club-record low of 19 losses in one campaign is not out of sight with five games left.

The idea that clarity over Howe’s future can wait until an end-of-season review feels backwards. Those talks will surely be instructed by this woeful end to the season, which itself is clearly being impacted by the dark cloud that is the review itself.

And considering how Newcastle cannot afford another bungled summer, going into it with that uncertainty over a manager who would expect more of a say than most seems sub-optimal.

It would be no surprise if Howe fell on his sword, full Keegan-style before the season ends. But the longer this staring contest goes on between the manager and owners, the more damage is done to the grand Newcastle project.

Everton

They have always intrinsically felt quite Spurs, and that was absolutely the history of the Everton.

Six 90th-minute winners is the most one side has ever conceded against a single opponent in Premier League history. For those to come against your bitter rivals and detested neighbours is really quite unfortunate.

David Moyes was right in that “there’s no shame in how we performed,” but losing the first Merseyside derby at their new stadium feels like a continuation of a deferential past Everton want to move on from, rather than a sign of their brave new future.

Wolves

The momentum built up by that four-game unbeaten run around the new year and sequence of one defeat in six before the international break has been entirely squandered and very possibly reversed.

While Wolves have been down for months – no-one willingly signs Adam Armstrong mid-season unless preparing for life in the second tier – Rob Edwards did seem to have laid some solid foundations for next season. But their running start in the Championship has again become a stumble out of the blocks with their shoes on the wrong feet and the laces tied together.

Losing 4-0 and 3-0 to ostensible relegation rivals would not have augured particularly well even without reports of infighting between their teenage bright light and the £24m summer signing who was fined, dropped against Leeds and is expected to be sold as soon as possible.

Then came news of Ladislav Krejci’s impending exit before he has even signed permanently.

Wolves do have an appointment with Dr Tottenham next so it might all work itself out, but it does all feel bleak again.

Burnley

From the time of their promotion in 2016 to the December 2020 takeover by ALK Capital, Burnley had 204 points from 167 games and retained their Premier League status for four consecutive seasons.

Since then, they have 102 points from 133 games and will soon be relegated for a third time in as many top-flight campaigns. Their goal difference in that time is now a nice, round -100.

Scott Parker is not fit for the purpose of Premier League management but – forgive the language – this has been a disaster of an ownership tenure.

Keith Andrews

Brentford remain permanently moored in 7th despite winning one of their last eight Premier League games, which only adds to the growing sense of frustration at an excellent season that is nevertheless petering out just before the finish line.

Theirs is not a particularly deep squad but might Andrews have benefited from trusting it more? Only David Moyes and Oliver Glasner have made fewer substitutions this campaign of all managers who have been in charge throughout, with zero changes in a goalless draw at home to Fulham encapsulating what many believe to be too risk-averse and passive an approach.

Marco Silva

Fulham remain permanently moored in mid-table, incapable of either qualifying for Europe or suffering relegation under the steady but uninspiring hand of Marco Silva.

Theirs is not a particularly deep squad so might Silva have benefited from trusting it less? No manager has made more substitutions in the Premier League this season, with five changes in a goalless draw away at Brentford encapsulating what many believe to be too erratic and unstable an approach.