English Premier League Season 2014/15 Review: No surprises at the top end

TOO GOOD: Chelsea players celebrate their title on the parade bus

1^st – Chelsea

Jose Mourinho’s men secured the title with three games to spare. That in itself, says a lot about Chelsea’s dominance in the 2014/15 season. Chelsea no doubt won their first premiership title in five years due to their unassailable start of the season. New signing Diego Costa was one of the best strikers in Europe before he was ravaged by injury for the past two months. His total of 20 goals in 26 Premier League appearances is a more impressive statistic than of his Golden Boot rivals Harry Kane, with 21 goals in 34 games, and Sergio Aguero, with 26 goals in 33 games. It is one of those cases of ‘what if’ the Spanish striker played a few more games for his side. But in the end, the West London team clearly didn’t need to rely on Costa with the luxury of PFA Player of the Year Eden Hazard and Cesc Fabregas at his use nearly all-year round.

Season Rating – 10

2^nd – Manchester City

For some reason, the media have virtually ignored the fact that Manchester City has gone through the motions this season without a trophy. Manuel Pellegrini’s squad surely has to be expected to take a Champions League spot, which they did, but also with the amount of flair and skill of some of its players win at least one piece of silverware year in year out. This season they didn’t even come close to one, and heavily relied on Argentine striker and Golden Boot winner Sergio Aguero to do most of the work. After a poor season, it looks like Yaya Toure is on his way out of the blue part of Manchester with plenty of world-class names been thrown up in the air to replace the Ivorian Coast midfielder. It is surprising that Pellegrini is still the Manager, but maybe that’s what the second-place side need to change for the better in comparison to previous years when the boss would be fired after one season.

Season Rating – 6

3^rd – Arsenal

Arsene Wenger has done a reasonable job with his players this season, and particularly with the purchase of former Barcelona winger Alexis Sanchez, with 16 league goals and eight assists in his debut season. If the Premier League was to start after Christmas, the North London side would be at the summit of the league - but a champion side is not crowned over five months of play. Due to a subpar start to the season, largely due to the World Cup taking its toll on key players, the Gunners simply couldn’t keep up with Chelsea. Arsenal has showed signs of improvement from last season having avoided the nerve-wrecking Champions League qualifier that Man United will have to endure. But ultimately Arsenal fans will agree that their side must win this weekend’s FA Cup final against Aston Villa to consider the season a success.

Season Rating – 7*         

*9 if Arsenal win the FA Cup

4^th – Manchester United

This season was always going to be a mission for Louis Van Gaal and the Red Devils with a line-up, apart from a few, completely different to the season before. Without any Champions League, I expected United to be fighting for the top two at least but it seems their defensive issues were deeper than first thought. Wayne Rooney was their highest league goal scorer with a total of 12, which was a tied 10^th on the leader board. Former Real Madrid winger and new signing Angel Di Maria notched the third highest number of assists with 10 but United fans will struggle to remember when the last assist actually happened considering Di Maria’s dismal back half to the season. Van Gaal is expected to be very busy in the transfer window and it’s no secret which positions need strengthening to challenge for the title next year – nearly everywhere.

Season Rating - 7

The Chasers...

Tottenham Hotspur got as close as it could get to the top-four despite young England striker Harry Kane bagging a League second-high 21 goals. It is quite clear that if Spurs are to progress then manager Mauricio Pochettino will need another striker to play alongside Kane or deputise him with at least 15 goals in ammo.

Liverpool’s latest season can only be considered as a disaster after failing miserably to invest and, especially, to replace last year’s Golden Boot winner and Barcelona striker Luis Suarez. It is hard to sift out many positives from the Reds season with the emergence of young midfielder Jordan Ibe and an evolving playmaker in Philipe Coutinho, of the few.

Considering the pedigree of players Southampton lost in the last transfer window, the Saints have done extremely well to finish seventh place this season. The quickest hat-rick in Premier League history from Sadio Mane two weeks ago was one of the many highlights for the South England side this season.

Swansea City, who finished eighth in a club record, has now created themselves a reputation of a very tough team to beat, who also play attractive football. Gary Monk’s side was tactically spot-on on numerous occasions and all without their previous leading goal scorer Wilfried Bony, who now plays for Man City.

Stoke City has had another solid season and manager Mark Hughes has to be given much of the credit after coming under heavy scrutiny in the past seasons - mostly for its rugby-style football.

Crystal Palace is now an established Premier League side after another comfortable finish in the mid-table region whereas Everton below them could be noted as one of the under-achieving sides of the season.

After nosing around the top-four around Christmas, it was only a matter of time before West Ham plummeted eventually to 12^th place which is more of a true reflection of the Hammers season.

West Bromich Albion had a wonderful conclusion to their season notably defeating Chelsea at home 3-0 two weeks ago while the same can be said about Leicester City, who undeniably was the surprise package of this season.

Newcastle United dodged a bullet after leaving it to the last day to avoid relegation in a run-in that only included one win from the last 11 games for the Toon.

Sunderland and Aston Villa both ended their seasons lethargically while the three teams going down consisting of Hull City, Burnley, and QPR, cannot have too many complaints about why they are all going to be playing Championships football next season.