Antonio Conte may have taken his team to the Premier League title last season, but he now knows he has a massive uphill task to try and catch Man City this season. He admits that Pep Guardiola has made it difficult to win the League, but he says it is just as hard a fight to stay in the Top Four and win a place in next year’s Champions League with the quality in the Premiership right now.
Conte said: “There are four places for six top teams. Don’t forget that last season Manchester United and Arsenal finished fifth and sixth.”.
“In this league there is still a great motivation for all, to try and fight until the end for the title,”
“In this moment it depends on Manchester City, who are winning every game. To draw only one game means you are having a fantastic run.
“Otherwise Chelsea, Manchester United, Tottenham, Liverpool and Arsenal and the other top teams, we stay there to fight and there is great motivation for us to fight for a place in the Champions League.”
That sounds like he doesn’t have much hope of catching City, but the fact is that it is just as hard to stay in the Top Four with Premiership clubs earning so much more than the other country’s Leagues thanks to the income from our TV deals.
Arsenal may be the 4th richest club in the Premier League, but does that mean they are entitled to a place in the Top Four?
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The other teams have already prepared for Chelsea’s and Arsenal’s 3-4-2-1. In the last season, it was a surprise and it made them had good runs.
Guardiola is more flexible. At the beginning of this season, he asked his players to play with 3-5-2 and tiki-taka style, then 4-1-3-2. After his players understood his concept, he used his favorite 4-3-3 formation.
Arsenal’s wealth is supposed to help Wenger to achieve a top four position, because they have more budget than the likes of Liverpool and Tottenham. But in reality, Liverpool is far more ambitious, shown by the purchase of Virgil Van Dijk in the upcoming January transfer window and Naby Keita in 2018.
We are supposedly richer than Liverpool but they have bought Van dijk & baby keita!
Tinpot club mentality and Wenger wants to be higher up in the table! Lol
Well I tell people in London that if you want to add a bit of comedy to your life then start following our club. Lol
The fact is Pep and City has made every other top team look so poor and now also made it a one horse race, worse than LA liga and Bundesliga as most believe they are two teams league
The only excitement left now is the fight for the top Four so I think Conte is honest and realistic.
I find it quite funny that the table is coincidentally arranged according to the the spending power of each club at the moment.
When I saw Mourinho and Conte complaining about lack of enough support from their respective clubs even when they have spent a lot, then I ask myself if these managers can even manage Arsenal or any other manager with a big pedigree.
Only few managers can manage Arsenal under the policy of this club as regards spending of money unless there will changes in the future
Maybe we need an article on this, we need coaches that can be effective under our budget.
That said, this does not justify Wenger’s poor,rigid and predictable tactics because personally I can’t trust Wenger to perform as Pep if given the present Man City team.
Because buying the players is surely not enough, tactics remains an essential part and I can’t rely on Wenger in that regard.
conte spending a lot? lol!..he sold costa for morata..matic for bakayoko…oscar for drinkwater …with change!
Sorry hate to admit it but top 4 has gone for us.
City, spurs, Chelsea, Man U, Liverpool, ?, then us in 7th.
@ GB
My friend I don’t think am ready to give up on that yet, lemme continue to hope for some kind of joy and excitement in order to enjoy the season(you can call me deluded) *☺ *
I mean some of my folks are already wishing the season was over and can’t wait to start a new one
Am still hoping for surprises….. And it can happen
You’re not deluded my friend and I will never give up hope, just not seen them playing this bad since I was a lad, and that was a very long time ago.
We want managers like Allegri, Enrique, Ancellotti and so on, these are top level managers that have managed biggest clubs and will want more success to boost and upgrade their pedigree and thus will need to spend a lot of money to achieve that.
Maybe we should consider managers like Simeone, Sean Dyche.
IMO these managers are effective and may be able to make us proud in this money league
Thumbs up draw
Thumbs down we lose
We won’t finish in the top 4. City, Spurs, United, Chelsea and Liverpool are all better than us innit
Looking that way
We seriously need to spend some cash next month! Or we’ll be looking at sixth place finish maybe even lower ☹
with VVD Liverpool are now way ahead of us. if Wenger won’t buy some 2-3 top players this month we have no chance of a top 4 finish