#FootballFocus: The race for Premier League supremacy is on

As Manchester City win and Arsenal drop points, the top half of the league is the most open it has been in months.

The Gunners have sat pretty atop the table since November 13, steadily widening the gap until drawing two games in a row over the last two game weeks, leaving four points on the table.

Both draws, against Liverpool and West Ham, came after Arsenal relinquished early 2-0 leads and late game frailty is starting to look like a real problem for Mikel Arteta’s young team.

Wizened pundits have been quietly backing City for months, trusting the battle-hardened team who have claimed four out of the last five league titles to steady on down the crucial late season stretch.

It appears to have been a smart bet and the chasing Cityzens are now just four points off the lead, with a game in hand and top of the table clash to look forward to on April 26.

This has come amidst impressive form in the league and Champion’s League, where Erling Haaland’s unbelievable goalscoring helped to beat a strong Bayern Munich team 3-0 last week.

Arsenal need to stop the rot quickly and should have an easy momentum builder against bottom-of-the-table Southampton at home on Saturday.

They will need every ounce of positivity to go to the Etihad and come away with points, their season now to be decide on the result when just two weeks ago it looked like nothing more than a potential stumbling block.

Fourth placed Newcastle had their winning streak snapped when they were trounced away at one of the league’s form teams, sixth placed Aston Villa, on Saturday.

Villa are unbeaten in eight and look like legitimate contenders for European football next year.

Manchester United eked out Nottingham Forest to move back to third, while Spurs suffered a huge comeback loss against Bournemouth to dampen their Champion’s League hopes.

Should Brighton win their two games in hand, they will overtake the North Londoners, with Liverpool hoping to pull off the improbable again to rise from eighth.

There are nine points in it between fourth and eighth, with everything to play for in the remaining seven game weeks (some teams have eight or nine because of rescheduled games).

It has been a thrilling season at both ends of the table and only four mid-table teams have nothing to play for.

That would once have been a massive anomaly, but evidences the strength of a league where almost every team can now afford to buy big.

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On the local front, Mamelodi Sundowns’ dreams of a perfect season have been quashed, as the Brazilians drew their last two league games to miss the chance at record points totals.

They lost to Stellenbosch FC in the Nedbank Cup quarter-final too and should they lose in the CAF Champions League on Saturday, their league title will be of little solace.

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