Is the Premier League a loser in thiscongested Christmas fixture pile-up?

Stamford Bridge, Saturday teatime. It's about half past five and Mark Hughes is sitting before the cameras and microphones of the media explaining the changes that placed his side in the hands of Antonio Conte's Chelsea to do with them what they wanted.
Stoke's Darren Fletcher reacts during the heavy defeat to Chelsea.Stoke's Darren Fletcher reacts during the heavy defeat to Chelsea.
Stoke's Darren Fletcher reacts during the heavy defeat to Chelsea.

Which of course they did by winning 5-0 and killing the game as a contest before it was 10 minutes old.

Hughes really didn’t have to explain anything. Everyone in the ground knew that he had surrendered the three points in the hope that his rested players would make them stronger for Monday’s game with Newcastle.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

In truth, though, a team that included two 18-year-olds and a 20-year old in their back five, plus a Charlie Adam who was starting his first Premier League game of the season, was always going to be fighting a losing battle against the inevitable waves of attack from the home team.

Even as a neutral observer, I couldn’t help think that I’d been robbed. I was there to watch Thibaut Courtois and Jack Butland but after seeing the line-up, I knew this wasn’t going to be contest a contest between two sides. This was basically a case of how many goals Chelsea could put past the Stoke keeper.

I had gone there in the hope Butland was going to have the game of his life and his campaign with Jordan Pickford for the starting spot at the World Cup would begin in earnest.

Unfortunately, he was robbed of that too - his defence putting him under immediate pressure by conceding a corner in the opening seconds before a Willian free-kick was headed home by Antonio Rudiger in an area I’m sure Butland would have have come to take the ball if he’d had a little longer to play himself in to the game.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

The early goals killed the atmosphere inside the ground too. The Stoke fans, outnumbered but still out-singing their counterparts, must have felt robbed too as they looked on at their makeshift side and then seeing Crystal Palace keep the Manchester City steamroller at bay and then go on to beat beleaguered Southampton on their own patch.

Roy Hodgson went on to say how he defied the sports scientists to use players despite their obvious fatigue - and the gambled worked. The question is though, should it even have to be a gamble at all?

Pep Guardiola has labelled it murder, killing the players, and I’m sure there will be some out there who rubbish this by saying they would play a game every day of the week in return for the sums City’s players are paid.

No question that most of us would, but when you have a product in the form of the Premier League that prides itself on being the best in the world, then you have to question why it then compromises the quality of said product.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Perhaps “why?” is a silly question because there are millions of reasons with the Queen’s head on them, but there has to be common sense brought to the situation.

The financial clout and rewards of the Premier League have given clubs the ability to build vast squads which should be able to cope with strenuous fixture lists and any injuries incurred, but the fear of losing that means it hands even more power to the top clubs in the league and reduces the standard of the competition.

I didn’t want to see Xherdan Shari, Choupo-Moting and Joe Allen doing keep-ups and taking part in possession boxes before the game. I want to see them give Chelsea a scare but they, and the result, were sacrificed to give Stoke a better chance of beating a team closer to them in the table.

So what we had was a procession where Chelsea could win at canter and conserve the energy of their own players even though they were still on the pitch. So despite their own protestations, because the top clubs have larger squads packed with more quality, it’s these clubs who are less affected by the congestion. They win at 70% against weakened teams or have the back-up to cope.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Were Stoke ever going to get a result at Stamford Bridge? Probably not, but they’d have had a better chance if they had a full-strength side out and if I was a Stoke fan and paid money to watch my side, I’d be unhappy that I’d shelled out my hard-earned money to watch something that was tantamount to a live sacrifice of one of my relatives.

Mark Hughes’s motives meant his side had accepted defeat just as he had and not only that, they went in to that Newcastle game with yet more damage inflicted on them individually and collectively, with Hughes himself copping more flak along the way.

So with a reduction in the quality of football, potentially more injuries and fatigue, and under-fire managers being criticised for fielding weakened teams, you are left asking if anyone actually wins out of playing all of these games so close together?