Ahead of the start of the new campaign, it was predicted that this season’s title race could be one of the tightest and most competitive in years.
And ten games in, those predictions look to have merit. As it stands, Chelsea lead the way, with Thomas Tuchel’s men sitting on 25 points after ten matches.
In second place is Jurgen Klopp’s Liverpool who, despite being the only remaining Premier League side yet to suffer defeat, still find themselves three points behind their London rivals.
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In third and a further two points behind the Reds is Manchester City who suffered a shock 2-0 loss at home to Crystal Palace last weekend.
While it’s Chelsea who are currently the team to catch, City and Liverpool do hold a slight edge in that, on paper at least, they’ve got some of their tougher fixtures of the campaign already out the way.
As highlighted above, based on the FiveThirtyEight forecasting index, the average predicted end of season positions for Liverpool’s combined opponents so far is 10.1.
So far, only eight sides have faced a tougher run of opening matches. One of those teams is City, though the difference between the two is only marginal - 9.9.
Meanwhile, in between key battles with Liverpool and City, the above highlights Chelsea have enjoyed one of the more favourable runs so far, and in fact there are only five sides who’ve had a better opening ten games on paper than the Champions League winners
.
This could hint that they might be at risk of dropping precious points in the coming weeks as they come to face more teams who are expected to predominantly be competing at the top end of the Premier League table this year.
Two of those tricky sides on the immediate horizon are Man United and Leicester City, their two next opponents after taking on Burnley this weekend.
The onus will therefore be on Liverpool to make sure they take advantage should Tuchel’s side come unstuck in any of those encounters, reclaiming top spot where they’ll then undoubtedly do all they can to stay for the remainder of the campaign.
