Seriously, have you ever seen anything as incredible in football as the last three minutes at the Etihad stadium last Sunday? As the clock ticked past the 90 minute mark, City were on their knees. 2-1 down to the team with the worst away record in the division, a team with 10 men on the field and the title slipping further away from their fingers as their deadly rivals from the red half of Manchester were getting ready to pop open the champagne with a 1-0 win up at Sunderland.
As QPR battled away, cleared every ball, got in the way of every shot and Paddy Kenny made a string of saves, everyone had started to believe that this wasn’t City’s year. This side are made of much sterner stuff though and refused to throw in the towel. One corner, one header – Edin Dzeko made it level at 2-2 with three injury-time minutes on the clock. Surely not? Only moments later, Sergio Aguero played a one-two with Mario Balotelli, avoided the late lunge of Nedum Onuoha, and – as Manchester and the football world held its breath – blasted the ball past Paddy Kenny at his near post. Absolute bedlam followed, players piled on each other, Mancini and his backroom stuff shared dramatic, emotional embraces. As the whistle blew, and the fans piled onto the pitch, you had to remind yourself of the sheer magnitude of what had just happened. Man City had snatched the title from right under the noses of neighbours Man United with two goals in injury time, taking the title on goal difference (the first Premier League winning team to do so) and bagging the club’s first title in 44 years. Magnificent. Absolute theatre.
In the aftermath of City’s dramatic title win, pundits on Sky, BBC and the like were quick to declare that the finale itself was something we’ll probably never see again in the Premier League and they’re not far wrong. How can anything be as dramatic as what we all witnessed on Sunday? The only thing that springs to mind (pre-Premier League era) is the 1988-89 season when Arsenal won the title at Anfield, pipping Liverpool to the post on goals scored. Pundits were also quick in stating that this was possibly the best Premier League season there’s been – Hansen, Shearer et al were fairly vehement in their views. Whilst it’s hard to argue that this season has produced some glorious moments, let’s not get carried away too much and discard the many other exciting campaigns that have been and gone.
By no means am I stating that this season hasn’t had its incredible moments. Far from it. How can we forget the seismic shift in power threatened by City in their 6-1 demolition of United at Old Trafford? Or Arsenal’s 5-2 mauling of Spurs in a north London derby which saw the start of Tottenham’s slide and the Gunners’ resurgence? Tim Howard scored a goal from his own penalty area, Papiss Cisse scored a goal which defied all logic, Clint Hill scored a header at the Reebok Stadium for QPR only to be waved ‘play on’ as the ball edged a yard over the line. There’s been moments and matches to savour such as the ones mentioned, but let’s get down to the bare facts – the title race was only ever between two teams and the relegation dogfight – as exciting as it was – panned out much like we expected it to as the table shaped up towards the end of the season. Everton finished seventh again, Liverpool underperformed and Stoke City survived.
To state that ‘11-‘12 was the best in 20 years of the Premier League does huge discredit to’95-’96 when three teams were jostling for the title, or ’98-’99 when Arsenal and United battled it out to the last day and started the beginning of a heated rivalry, or the ’03-’04 season in which we saw Wenger’s Gunners go a whole season unbeaten. Whilst it must be difficult for pundits and panellists alike to stray from hyperbole, it’s also important to maintain that no one season is better than another considering that so much football is played and so many incidents are packed into nine months.
This season has been superb but simply just another in a long list of many. The finale will go some way towards being trumped but the season itself – we’ve seen it before and, hopefully, we’ll see it again next season. Roll on August.
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