Manchester City celebrate famous domestic treble

The 2018-19 season of the Premier League saw football fans witness arguably the greatest title race in the history of the competition, with Liverpool and the eventual champions Manchester City setting new benchmarks in terms of quality and the relentless winning of matches.

It may have been Pep Guardiola’s outfit that emerged victorious on the last day, and claimed the League and FA Cups too, but Jurgen Klopp’s Liverpool will go down as the best ever runners-up, having accumulated 97 points – just one shy of City’s total.

The Anfield club would have won the league in 25 of the seasons in the Premier League era with their 97 points, but in 2018-19 they were just, just shy of matching the ruthless champions in Man City. It was a season of failure for Fulham, Cardiff City, and Huddersfield Town, who all dropped down to the English championship.

CHANGES

With City having broken the 100-point barrier in the Premier League the season before, Guardiola didn’t feel the need to break something else – the bank – in the summer of 2018, with their net spend coming at just over £20m after the sale of various fringe players helped fund the purchase of Riyad Mahrez from Leicester.

Manchester Utd spent a little more, but Jose Mourinho was left frustrated at their inability to secure a top-drawer centre-back, with just Diogo Dalot and Fred coming in of note. The biggest spenders were Liverpool, who signed Alisson, Fabinho, and Xherdan Shaqiri, while Naby Keita also finally joined after his agreed transfer in January.

For Chelsea, they shelled out £72m on the world’s most expensive goalkeeper, Kepa Arrizabalaga, from Athletic, while new head coach Maurizio Sarri brought in Jorginho from his former club Napoli as well as Mateo Kovacic and Gonzalo Higuain, with the latter joining in January. They would also arrange a 2019 summer transfer for Christian Pulisic of Dortmund. As well as at Chelsea, there were new managerial eras at Arsenal with Unai Emery, Everton with Marco…

Source link : https://www.footballcritic.com/season-reviews/manchester-city-celebrate-famous-domestic-treble-the-2018-19-premier-league/22

Author : [email protected] (Martin Macdonald)

Publish date : 2024-08-04 11:00:00

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