It was another big day in the Premier League. Teams were looking to make a push for positions as the season winds down. Obviously the biggest race is the race for 1st, but the race for 4th is extremely important as well. If a team makes the top 4, that means a berth in the Champions League, and that means notoriety, a chance for players to shine, but perhaps most importantly for the team, additional revenue to continue to grow in the future.
Race for 1st
It was a goal of maintaining the status quo for the top 2 teams in the Premier League. Manchester United were at home to Bolton where they are unbeaten. And Arsenal was away at relegation threatened West Brom. Should be easy wins for both teams right? Think again. Manchester created trouble for themselves when Johnny Evans (who has been a terrible defensive replacement all year) got a straight red card for a tackle on American Stuart Holden late in a game in which Bolton had threatened plenty of times. Fortunately for them, Berbatov came to the rescue extremely late in the game to seal the win. No one can knock him for not scoring important goals anymore.
Arsenal's defense has been unkindly labeled as the gift that keeps on giving. It is often the mark of extremely offensively talented teams that the defensive is vulnerable. In this case, Arsenal gave up a goal in the first 5 minutes to dig themselves a hole. West Brom made that hole even deeper early in the 2nd half. Arsenal did show fight to battle back and tie the game, but it's getting a little late in the season to be giving away points teams at the bottom of the table
Race for 4th
In this particular race, Tottenham is fighting to keep themselves in the Champions League. This season they are making a great showing in the Champions League, but they may not make it back because they didn't do themselves any favors today. They were at home against another team that is fighting the relegation battle: West Ham. I got up early to watch some of this game. And I must say I didn't see much sense of urgency from Spurs. In the last 20 minutes or so that I saw, they didn't show much attacking spirit. But then again, maybe West Ham's desire to avoid relegation trumped the SPurs desire to make it into the Champions League. That seems strange to me, but who knows...?
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