Manchester City are locked in a Premier League title battle with Arsenal, but the schedule could be cruel for the Blues.
Manchester City face a frantic showdown as they chase glory in the Premier League and FA Cup.
Manchester City could face a nightmare in the final weeks of the season as the Blues await dates for two decisive Premier League matches.
The Blues have five league games left, but they only have dates for three of them. City visit Everton on Bank Holiday Monday to start the night before hosting Brentford at the Etihad next Saturday at teatime. The final day will see Pep Guardiola’s team take on Aston Villa on Sunday, May 24.
But the home game against Crystal Palace, initially canceled due to City’s involvement in the Carabao Cup final, and the trip to Bournemouth next month, which will now need a new date as it coincides with the FA Cup final, are still to be organised.
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Palace are still in the Conference League and have a two-leg semi-final against Shakhtar Donetsk this week and next. There is too little notice to fit Bournemouth into this week’s schedule, and City’s trip to Everton on Monday night means it can’t happen next week either.
This means that the two pending games will be played in the last fortnight of the campaign. City would probably prefer to play Bournemouth first, for sporting and logistical reasons, but with the Palace match being the first to be postponed and the Conference League final taking place after the conclusion of the top-flight season, the Premier League may try to rearrange the games in chronological order.
That would likely make the home game against Palace take place on Wednesday, May 13, given that Palace have a Sunday date with Everton on May 10, with the trip to Bournemouth the following week. The problem for City is the Europa League final, which will take place on Wednesday, May 20. Generally speaking, UEFA prefers to avoid domestic matches being held at the same time as European matches, especially the finals, and especially because the Premier League will have a representative in the European final, with Aston Villa and Nottingham Forest in the semi-finals.
That could mean City travel to Bournemouth on Tuesday, May 19, just three days after the FA Cup final at Wembley, meaning back-to-back long trips and almost no training time. While it would give City a longer period until the Villa game on the final day of the campaign, and potentially an extra day of rest compared to their opponents if Unai Emery’s side reach the final in Istanbul, it would condense five games into 16 days in a crucial period of the campaign.
It’s a run of games that Pep Guardiola called “terrible” after the FA Cup semi-final victory over Southampton, but if City are to overtake Arsenal at the top of the table they will have to do it the hard way.