Manchester City and Liverpool embarked on an epic Premier League title race last season as they recorded the two highest points tallies in the history of the competition.
It went down to the final day of the campaign as Pep Guardiola's side took the glory with their victory over Brighton edging out Liverpool despite their win over Wolves.
While it doesn't take away from the drama of the contest, those who take a statistical look at things calculated that the teams ended up a lot closer than they should have. Whether basing judgements on decisions that went for or against the title contenders, or working from expected goals, the common conclusion was that Liverpool did better than they should have done - one site puts the gap at seven points rather than the one it ended up as.
That isn't necessarily a criticism of Jurgen Klopp's team - City also overperformed according to some analyses and it is a mark of a top team - but it does raise the question of how long you can keep defying expectation. The better the side, the longer it goes on; Ole Gunnar Solskjaer's United are one that started by scoring considerably more goals than was expected from the quality of their chances created and have since reverted to a more normal level and are thus picking up worse results.
Guardiola's City have already established themselves as formidable, winning two league titles with an average of 99 points and showing early signs of a similar level of dominance this season. But they were made to work incredibly hard last season by a Liverpool side that set off at a ferocious pace and barely dropped their level.
Four games in, admittedly a much smaller sample, and Klopp's men (and City, to a lesser extent) have already scored more and conceded fewer than expected. More importantly, they are the only team with a 100 per cent win rate.
If that start has been enough to suggest that Guardiola and his players will face another almighty battle for the trophy, their relentlessness ensures that the onus is still on Liverpool to keep up their pace rather than the Blues to up theirs. And especially after last season when there was at one point a seven-point gap between the two, the challengers should be well aware that the champions can last the 38-game test.
As they sit in second place, City will watch and wait to see how long Liverpool can last this time.
