In the 80s, and possibly also through the 90s, you would have seen Liverpool as your rivals. Now that you have surpassed their top-flight honours record, and especially since they fell off their perch under Benitez and have been, at best, a limp version of their former selves over the past two seasons, who do you see as your closest rivals today? I would have said Chelsea, but I think it is clearly emerging that City are going to your rivals for many, many years to come. I think this is good for English football, because big teams are driven hardest when they have an evenly matched local rival (such as us with Arsenal, and Chelsea with Fulham). Even LFC, being on about the same level as Everton, will find renewed vigour in their local derby games, swelling both the crowds and the excitement levels. So, do you see City as being your current rivals? And, like me, do you see this as being a good thing for football, in general?
City, Chavs, Liverpool and Arsenal are rivals, with City being the biggest for now. Its good as in the case there are 5 teams looking for the top 4, and even the spuds may play a big part in getting 5th spot.
I agree, there is more than one team capable of winning the league this season and you could go as far as saying there are 6 teams with a team good enough to do so. united, citym chelsea,arsenal, liverpool and spurs these are all big rivals now Our biggest rivals will most prob always be city and liverpool
This City look like our main challengers this season, and for the foreseeable future unless FFP bites early, but you can never write off Chelsea given their experience of challenging and winning over the last few years. And Liverpool and Arsenal still have the quality to spring a surprise, although they do look weaker than City and Chelsea at the moment. But Liverpool are still major long term rivals, and that will always be the case no matter who is challenging us for the title this year. City will need to put at least six or seven league titles under their belt before they have the same kind of significance to us as Liverpool do imo. It's always good to mix the top teams around a bit - no one wants the PL to end up like Scotland or La Liga over the last twenty years where 90% of the league titles end up with the same two teams, and those two teams occupy 1st and 2nd place more often than that. Chelsea broke the Utd - Arsenal monopoly and now City are coming along to break the Utd - Chelsea monopoly. Hopefully Liverpool and Arsenal can kick on and make this year a genuine three, or even four, way battle for top spot.
