Manchester City show incredible form record but still yet to be at their best
The title race is narrowly moving towards the favour of the champions.
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00:00 Manchester City have lost one since Arsenal in early October. It's quite astonishing. It was away Aston Villa, who at the time were possibly creeping on the title charge.
00:17 But in terms of that title race, they're slowly creeping and the game in hand is coming up as well. Liverpool and Arsenal have got to be looking at them and thinking, 'Not again, surely?'
00:32 It's a funny one because you're absolutely right in what you say and they are starting to look pretty ominous. They're putting together a really good run of form and if you're Arsenal and Liverpool, you look and think, 'Wow, this is what City do every year' and they eventually win the title.
00:45 And then at the same time, they're not playing that brilliantly, I don't think. They're absolutely controlling games, dominating games, having so many shots, but actually finding scoring goals and winning matches a bit problematic.
00:59 And they're conceding a lot of goals. They went on a run recently where they'd only conceded or they kept one clean sheet in 13 Premier League matches.
01:07 OK, they've kept two in the last three since then, which is worth adding, but they're not quite at the same level as they were, let's say, this time a year ago, going into the spring of 2023.
01:19 And then at the same time, they've put together this brilliant record you mentioned since October, but they've actually, since that Villa game, 16 matches they haven't lost, they've won 14 of them. That's absolutely brilliant, the record that City are on.
01:33 Guardiola, he's getting a bit annoyed about talk of whether City are playing well or not and he basically said something along the lines during the week of, 'Oh, if City win, we're impossible to stop, no one can stop us.
01:45 And if we don't win, it's, oh, City aren't as good as they've been in the past.' And I think there's a bit of truth in that, but I think, as I said, they are playing well and they are looking good, but they're still, I don't think, I still think they're quite a way off where they were this time last year.
02:00 And we could do a whole video on that and why that's the case. But yeah, I still think they'll win the title, but I do have this, if I were City, I would have this kind of little half concern that they just haven't quite got back up to their pace yet.
02:14 And look, who knows, it could suddenly all click into gear and they could get back to what we'll have to see, obviously, over the coming weeks.
02:20 And you mentioned the title race, just to emphasise again that City, after this weekend, will have played the same number of matches as Liverpool and Arsenal.
02:28 Obviously, Liverpool in the Cardboard Cup this weekend, so in the final of that, so they're not going to be playing this weekend. Arsenal, obviously, in action.
02:34 And then we'll have all three teams playing the same number of games, which I think gives us a bit more of a balance in terms of looking at the title race and trying to make assessments and draw conclusions from it at this early stage still.