Joe Camporeale – USA Today Sports
With the Premier League just six weeks away, the time has come to decide who the front-runner is at winning the title. This may not come as a surprise to most of you: Manchester United. Before anyone decides to judge, keep on reading.
United have won their 20th Premier League title this past season in convincing fashion — winning it by a whopping 11 points ahead of arch-rival Manchester City. This was a big statement that proved there is still a huge difference between the red and blue of Manchester.
Now, with quite a few changes taking place in England, including a huge coaching change at United (David Moyes in for Sir Alex Ferguson), a change of power was expected … but most likely will not happen.
Moyes, who was the headman at Everton for 11 years, is known to be loyal and attached to the club he is running … just like Sir Alex. He is going to have much of the same experienced squad from last season’s championship winning side plus reinforcements of his own. Therefore, defending the title is still expected of the club.
Chelsea and Manchetser City, two sides who have recently won titles in the Premier League, have both appointed new coaches — Jose Mourinho back to Chelsea and Manuel Pellegrini has taken the reigns at City.
Mourinho won the EPL with his beloved blues in 2005 and 2006. He knows how to get the job done — especially now that he has won titles in Italy and Spain with Inter Milan and Real Madrid respectively. With all that he has learned there, he can build on his Premier League knowledge and perhaps meaningfully fight for the title.
Pellegrini coached Real Madrid for one year from 2009-2010 then went on to coach Malaga for the next three seasons. He impressed this past term when he led the club to a record semi-final finish in the Champions League during the club’s first-ever appearance in the competition. Now, he has his first taste of English top league soccer with a team that is expecting nothing less than a championship.
Manchester United, Manchester City and Chelsea are the top three candidates to win the most prestigious English league title. Anything could happen, but if history and paper serves right, United will win it … again.
