Week 34 of the Premier League was short in games and short in surprises, but that didn’t stop it from teaching us a few things about the status of the division’s title fight, European race, and relegation scrap.
Arsenal and Liverpool won while Man City was on FA Cup duty, while Newcastle, Manchester United, Brighton, and Chelsea all got boosts from losses by West Ham and Wolves. Burnley and Everton boosted their safety hopes while Nottingham Forest, Luton, and Sheffield United are less than pleased with their weekends.
Oh, and three Premier League clubs on other dockets — the FA Cup semifinal round at Wembley — made sure to entertain in London.
Manchester City scrapped its way into the final with a 1-0 win over Chelsea on Saturday, a much more fulfilling victory than Manchester United blowing a 3-goal lead and needing penalties to escape Coventry City’s grasp at Wembley on Sunday.
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But let’s talk about Unai Emery’s Aston Villa.
It’s not just that Villa is the last team in Europe and has dealt with schedule congestion to stay a top-four candidate on the Premier League table, it’s how they are doing it.
Emery’s men baffled Arsenal a week ago and had to regroup for a Lille team bidding to overturn a Conference League deficit. Lille did that, in a sense, but Villa never wavered and won in penalties. Many would’ve picked Villa to suffer a letdown against a hungry and underrated Bournemouth side. Yet the Villans had the moxie to both find energy after a slow start versus the Cherries and to get the game to cruise control by the end of it.
This is a very good team.
Here are 10 thoughts from our writers, as Joe Prince-Wright, Andy Edwards, and Nick Mendola share their observations from across the most recent PL games.
10 things we learned from Week 34 of the 2023-24 Premier League season
Rotation key to keeping Liverpool in title race
Just because Liverpool have a lot of key players back fit doesn’t mean they need to start every game. Missing so many stars for a prolonged period, Klopp was forced to rotate heavily throughout the winter and it worked extremely well as players seemed to be fresh, both physically and mentally. In recent games some of Klopp’s established players have looked jaded. Perhaps they’ve been rushed back from injury and gone straight back into playing games — because they are big names — every three days without a rest. That just isn’t possible and the decision to start Mohamed Salah, Darwin Nunez, Dominik Szoboszlai, Alexis Mac Allister and Ibrahima Konate on the bench at Fulham worked a treat. Liverpool looked fresh, sharp and Fulham couldn’t handle their movement. Klopp now has five games remaining as Liverpool manager, all in the Premier League, and if he wants to go out on the ultimate high as a Premier League winner then he should keep rotating heavily. They have Everton away in midweek, then West Ham away and then Tottenham at home the following weekend before an eight-day rest until their trip to Aston Villa on May 13. Klopp has to manage this expertly and get Liverpool to their game at Villa with their entire squad firing on all cylinders. Because to win a title you need everyone to step up and Liverpool, more than anybody, have learned that from this season. Now it is time to give everyone the chance to be a hero as Klopp’s farewell tour enters the final stretch. — Joe Prince-Wright
Arsenal win with smothering defensive performance
At this point of the season, it doesn’t matter one bit how you get the results; only that you get them. Wolves aren’t an easy team to break down, as they have proven all season. Fortunately for the Gunners, Gary O’Neil’s hosts were very shorthanded on the counter-attack, with Pedro Neto and Matheus Cunha out due to injuries. That meant that Mikel Arteta could push his back line higher and higher up the field without fear of Wolves beating them in behind (which they didn’t). Every touch was contested and taken under intense pressure from two or three red shirts, which meant that when one attack inevitably ran into a brick wall, another wasn’t long from being launched. The result? 0.14 xG on five shots for Wolves. Arsenal were hardly better in terms of quality (0.05 per shot themselves), but they had plenty of volume (24 shots) that, after remaining patient and sticking with it, finally paid dividends in the end. — Andy Edwards
Emery, Watkins continue to burnish award credentials
If there was ever a game for Aston Villa to understandably falter, it was Sunday. The Villans had beaten Arsenal last weekend and needed 120 minutes plus penalties to get past Lille in France on Thursday. Surely Unai Emery, Ollie Watkins, and friends would struggle at least a little, and they did early at Villa Park. It was possession but not much else in an even first half that looked destined to end 1-0 to the visitors. But a great team goal saw Morgan Rogers, who is really coming into his own, make it 1-1 before the break and Ollie Watkins, Moussa Diaby, and Leon Bailey take over in the second half. Watkins set up Villa’s other two goals, rarely looking like one of the few players who played all 120 minutes on Thursday. Emery’s been well-admired as a tournament boss but this has been something else. He deserves real consideration for Premier League Manager of the Year if he holds off Ange Postecoglou and Spurs for fourth place, and Watkins is atop the PL assist list while also threatening to Golden Boot race. Player of the Year is not crazy. — Nick Mendola
Escape still possible, but Kompany’s Burnley will have to make it great
We’ve seen some good attacking play out of Burnley this year, but the Clarets are going to have to find something they haven’t all season if a great escape is on the cards. Burnley’s wins this season now include a season sweep of Sheffield United as well as defeats of Luton Town, Fulham, and Brentford. Draws? Forest, Brighton, Luton, Fulham, West Ham, Chelsea, Wolves, and Brighton again. If you’re doing the math, that’s one win from a top-half sides and four more points from drawing top-10 teams. Next up? 7th, 6th, and 5th. If they want a finale that matters against Forest, they need to find something special, and maybe twice. — Nick Mendola
Healthy Eagles flying higher
Say what you will about West Ham’s poor performance, but Palace didn’t waste their chance to take advantage of it. Selhurst Park is finally seeing the vision of attack Palace’s admin envisioned before the season, as healthy Eberechi Eze and Michael Olise create so much room for their teammates. It had paid off for Odsonne Edouard before and today it was Jean-Philippe Mateta. The 26-year-old now has nine Premier League goals this season. There are just so many more chance when players like Eze and Olise are buzzing around the pitch, and the Eagles’ attack looks deep now that Jordan Ayew and Edouard can come off the bench rather than be expected to star on a weekly basis. — Nick Mendola
Forest right to fume about penalty kick calls but statement took it too far
Nottingham Forest released a strongly worded statement hitting out at the VAR official, Stuart Attwell, for their game against Everton: “Three extremely poor decisions - three penalties not given - which we simply cannot accept. We warned the PGMOL that the VAR is a Luton fan before the game but they didn’t change him. Our patience has been tested multiple times. NFFC will now consider its options.” Were Forest right to do so? No. Former referee Mark Clattenburg is on their staff and has already been involved in hitting out at the PGMOL after Forest’s late defeat to Liverpool earlier this season. He should know better. Forest have to show restraint but the points deduction and run of one win from nine games has added extra concern in their relegation scrap. The pressure is building on Nuno Espirito Santo’s side and it is correct that they should have had two penalty kicks for the handball against Ashley Young and the foul on Callum Hudson-Odoi, while another penalty kick decision could have easily gone for them as Reyna was taken out by Young, again, in the box. Forest were unlucky with the calls but to publicly call into question the professionalism of a VAR official, Attwell, based solely on his fandom is quite something. We’ve never seen anything like this before and Forest are entering dangerous territory as Attwell will now be under serious scrutiny and become a public target. Did Attwell make a few mistakes? Yes. Did he do that because he’s a Luton fan? Absolutely not. Forest are clutching at straws here and this statement showed their frustration and should have been left in their drafts. — Joe Prince-Wright
Course correction for victorious Bees, fading Hatters
Luton have played above their level given all the long-term injuries on the newly-promoted side. Brentford have missed a great deal of time from attacking stars and under-performed their xG for most of the season. Is it as simple to say that two dams broke at the same time on Saturday? We don’t think so. Bryan Mbeumo was very good as Yoane Wissa hit 10 goals in a Premier League season and long-injured Kevin Schade made it goal contributions in consecutive weeks. Even without Ivan Toney, this was a Brentford we’ve seen before and it further wore out an eroded Luton lineup. — Nick Mendola
Bad at the back Blades get no bounces
Sheffield United have now conceded 88 goals this season in the Premier League, leaking 12 more goals than any of the high-powered attacks have even managed to score this season. Yes, Man City’s potency going forward is not as powerful as Blades’ penchant for letting teams through to their goalkeepers. While no one would brag about their 70-plus expected goals allowed on the season, Blades haven’t gotten any luck either. And the first two goals Saturday showed that, with little turns off attempted blocks wrong footing the keeper to boot. Chris Wilder’s men have been bad, but they’ve also had bad luck. Blades managed 2.59 xG, conceded 1.75 xGA, and lost by four. Fired Paul Heckingbottom is probably somewhere bummed for his players but wondering how much greener than grass looks now. — Nick Mendola
‘Atrocious’ West Ham a proper letdown to Moyes, European hopes
West Ham had a proper scrap at midweek, nearly overturning a first leg Europa League quarterfinal deficit to unbeaten Bayer Leverkusen, but David Moyes still expected much better from his men as they push to keep hold of a European place with a few matches left in a brutal table run. They probably needed three points at Selhurst Park, and definitely didn’t need to lose by three as goal differential could matter and the Reds still play Liverpool, Chelsea, and Man City (in addition to Luton Town). The Irons were overrun by Eberechi Eze and Michael Olise, with Jean-Philippe Mateta clinical with the final ball. It was 4-0 before West Ham found a reply, and that was all in the first half. Moyes said West Ham “were atrocious, and we got what we deserved,” but his tenure in London deserves better than flailing at the end. They’ve dropped to eighth on the table and will likely fall behind Chelsea at some point due to matches-in-hand. His players would’ve been tired after Leverkusen, but this performance from his players was repugnant. — Nick Mendola
Dyche’s men get it done, but what about his future?
Sean Dyche has navigated an insane season at Everton, one with multiple points deductions for violations prior to his time with the club and also without the proper budget for summer or January reinforcements. He also had to get his Toffees off the mat and in the right frame of mind for a monumental relegation six-pointer after a 6-0 Monday shellacking at Chelsea. No surprise, the Ginger Mourinho got it done (with a little help from an officiating crew that must really appreciate Ashley Young). Everton’s 30 points are five clear of the bottom three and eight shy of what they would be without deductions. On top of that, Everton’s expected points are 11th at 45.94 (according to Understat). All this while not getting the penalty rub of the green — eight conceded compared to just two won — and more shots taken than given away to opposition. Firing Dyche would be remarkably unfair given the obstacles in his path while at Everton, but keeping him means meeting his needs in the transfer market and hoping that life would be easier without relegation hanging over their heads all season. Plus does he have any interest in seeking a new challenge after this wild season? I’m a big Dyche fan, but unsure whether there’s clear wisdom for either side in this situation. — Nick Mendola
