Man United and Arsenal can only watch on as three fight for title

Another compelling Premier League season is reaching its end game with a three-way fight to the line that promises to deliver a very special climax.

Manchester City and Liverpool won their mid-week games to keep the pressure very firmly on Chelsea, who still have the Champions League to worry about. City, meanwhile, have two games in hand over the other pair and if they were to win all nine of their remaining matches there would be nothing their two rivals could do about it. But that won’t happen… will it?

There are so many intriguing twists and turns to come at the top of the table, but one thing we now know for sure is that Arsenal will not win the League this season. And Manchester United? Their chances went from slim to zilch quite a while ago. While both these clubs are still involved in a Cup competition each, as far as the League is concerned one is grimly stranded in seventh position, the other desperately hanging onto fourth. So what went wrong for them?

The most consistent criticism concerning United over the course of the season has been their lack of pace, particularly in midfield, though also in defence. Even before taking on the might of City at Old Trafford on Tuesday they had already lost five home games, and nine in all. That’s a serious jolt to the system for a club of this calibre, actually unprecedented for them in the Premier League era.

\By springtime, this late in the season, you’d have thought the manager would have some idea of his preferred formation and playing personnel, but United’s strategy has been such a mess from the very start. One can easily imagine David Moyes lying in bed wondering whether to play the mercurial Shinji Kagawa or how to make the most out of marquee signing Juan Mata. There are times when he must surely wake up screaming, wondering if the Marouane Fellaini who regularly produces such moderate performances in a Manchester United shirt is the same Fellaini who was such a force for good at Everton under Moyes himself.

And so it was that United, even though they were coming off back-to-back wins against Galatasaray and West Ham, sleepwalked into the Manchester derby with yet another untested midfield formation. We had a central trio of Fellaini, Michael Carrick and Tom Cleverley as part of a 4-3-3 – and within 45 seconds it was ripped to shreds in the most damning way possible as David Silva surged through gaps that were meant to be plugged, and Edin Dzeko scored a very early opening goal.

Moyes changed the system after just 10 minutes when he pushed Cleverley out to an unfamiliar right-sided role and Juan Mata becoming the number 10. It was neither an attacking nor a defensive switch – it was simply a return to United’s usual shape, with Moyes recognising his players were completely at sea. At half-time he decided to take Cleverley off altogether, even though United were beginning to exert a little pressure on City. It was all to no avail, of course, though a 3-0 defeat was at least no worse than they had suffered at the hands of Liverpool nine days earlier. Mind you, quite what Bayern Munich will do to them is another matter altogether.

Arsenal’s collapse has been much more sudden. Top of the league as recently as early February, they have spiraled out of control with three defeats, two draws and only two wins in their last seven games. Five goals were conceded at Liverpool and six at Chelsea.

Criticisms have been levelled at midfielders who don’t bother tracking back, at the lack of natural leaders, tactical naivety and lack of clear structure. When the one-touch football is going well, they’re a delight to watch. In adversity, they wilt.

At home to Swansea on Tuesday, they played like the underdogs at times, and trailed for most of the match. Finally, Lukas Podolski scored one and created another for Olivier Giroud in the space of just 68 seconds. They still managed to gift their opponents a late equaliser - Per Mertesacker’s attempted clearance striking Wojciech Szczesny and then Mathieu Flamini before nestling in their own goal.

Injuries have dogged Arsenal since the very start of this campaign. Even now, Aaron Ramsey, Mesut Özil, Theo Walcott and Jack Wilshere are out, and none are likely to become available before the end of the season. Some Arsenal fans wonder why their players fail to recover from injury as quickly as those at other clubs; others feel Arsene Wenger contributes to the issue by declining to rotate players.

Either way, it’s now the case that they, along with United, are cast in the role of mere spectators when it comes to determining who will actually win the title this season.