If Manchester City had managed to beat Chelsea at Stamford Bridge on Saturday, there was a chance it could have obtained the momentum to go on and rid itself of the “one season on, one season off” syndrome with which it has been afflicted ever since it won the league under Roberto Mancini.
If Chelsea had managed to beat City, it would almost certainly have been the moment when its season turned into a procession towards the league title, and Jose Mourinho could become confident of capturing his first one of those things for three years.
As it is, the two best teams in English football for the first six months of this season combined forces and drew with each other, establishing instead that, at this moment, neither one of them is quite the powerhouse it would probably prefer to be.
Watch Saturday’s highlights: Chelsea 1, Manchester City 1 || Manchester United 3, Leicester City 1 || Liverpool 2, West Ham United 0 || West Bromwich Albion 0, Tottenham 3 || Hull City 0, Newcastle United 3 || Crystal Palace 0, Everton 1 || Stoke City 3, Queens Park Rangers 1 || Sunderland 2, Burnley 0
Chelsea still looks exactly like the favourite to win the Premier League this season, and City still looks exactly like its most realistic competition, but neither looks exactly an intimidating presence at the top of the league right now. The likes of Arsenal, Liverpool, Manchester United and Tottenham haven’t had all hope for this and next season extinguished as it might have been by a dominant performance from either shade of blue in the “Oligarch Derby.”
What played out at Stamford Bridge was a slow-burn example of two sides lacking the conviction that should come with their status.
City, requiring three points to inject some notion of realism into its latest attempt at that title, went with two defensive midfielders, two defensive fullbacks, and two defensive wide players against Mourinho’s team. Chelsea, top of the league and the most seductive team in it at the same time, played a game of “wait and see” for the entire 90 minutes—waiting and seeing if City would come at it before it went at City. I believe it’s still waiting.
The message from both was that even if they reckon they’re good enough to win this league, they’re definitely not sure enough of it to take any risks in the name of winning it well. Neither Manuel Pellegrini nor his touchline rival at Chelsea is prepared to take chances on throwing anything away before they absolutely have to.
And, in some ways, good for them—that makes sense. Maybe they both believe their teams will come out on top in this league without issuing any killer blows—simply by sticking around long enough for the other to pass away quietly into the night. But, in other ways, we’ve been shown that neither manager really trusts his team enough to commit to taking on its main rivals head-on. And that’s weakness, of a kind.
At their best, both of these teams have gone to play title rivals with a sense of relish. Both have smashed Manchester United at home and away in recent seasons. None of that confidence was on display today. Chelsea could have moved eight points clear and City could have moved to within two points of the top with a win. But in the last ten minutes Pellegrini took off David Silva and Sergio Aguero, while Mourinho replaced his goal-scorer, Loic Remy, with a third centre-back, Gary Cahill.
They were supposed to be better than this. People like me had written up Chelsea as potentially invincible a few months ago, and City spent December powering its way back into the kind of form that somehow robbed a brilliant Liverpool of the title last season. Where’s all that gone? Was it ever really there or did we all just think it was there?
It seems as though all it’s taken to force both sides into an existential retreat is a couple of bad FA Cup results and the absence of a couple of key players each.
City, without Yaya Toure (and Wilfred Bony), too often turned back or looked wide rather than tackling Chelsea head-on. Chelsea, without its excellent summer signings, Diego Costa and Cesc Fabregas, instantly reverted to the team it was last season: absolutely solid, but lacking that terrifying ability to pick top-class opponents off whenever it feels like it.
Was it all artifice—that sense that either of these two were capable of being pretty brilliant? Are both of these teams’ minds so easily changed about how good they are or might be? It’s not about one result, exactly; it’s about the mentality behind that result and where it comes from. If they don’t believe they’re brilliant, if they’re happy to try and edge out a title rather than sprint towards it, doesn’t everyone else start believing they can, at some point, catch them?
City is most vulnerable. United is now as close to it in the league as it is to Chelsea. Southampton, Arsenal, Liverpool and Tottenham are all close enough and in good enough form to challenge it too. Chelsea is safer, and might well be in the clear for this season, but it’s allowed the situation at the top of the Premier League to feel murkier than it otherwise might have done. Where a few months ago it was kind of starting to look like Chelsea could be the dominant force in English football for the next three or four years, suddenly “dominance” seems absurd. It seems pleased enough with just winning.
With their ongoing recoveries, any of Arsenal, Tottenham, Liverpool and United can take confidence from Chelsea and City’s lack of confidence. Even if and when they win this league, there’s some evidence that they’re not actually that scary.
Ethan Dean-Richards is a London-based writer. Follow him on Twitter