Bluffers’ Guide to the Premier League weekend: stats show how Leicester have (almost) done it

The obvious numbers don’t stack up - so just what is Claudio Ranieri’s winning secret?

Leicester City stand one victory away from the Premier League title and every self-respecting bluffer will be wanting to be able to answer the question: “How on earth did this happen?” The commanding bluffer will wish to avoid waffle and pontification: instead they will want killer stats: and we have them.

But before moving on to dissect Claudio Ranieri’s achievement, are there any crumbs of comfort for Tottenham fans in the bluffer’s audience? There are.

Leicester City do, after all, have to win at Old Trafford, an achievement that previous incarnations of the club have accomplished only once in Premier League history, and one that even this season may prove more difficult than many may suppose.

For all the derision directed at Louis van Gaal this season, his team’s home record is the third best in the table (behind two Citys, Leicester and Manchester) and Tottenham, Liverpool and Arsenal have all been defeated at Old Trafford. So Spurs still have a glimmer of hope - at least until they play the self-confessed Leicester fans of Chelsea at Stamford Bridge on Monday night.

But back to Ranieri and his marauding Foxes. What is the secret of their success? It is not youth - the average age of the team that played last weekend was 28, with four players aged 30 or over. Tottenham, by contrast, have the youngest squad in the League.

It is not the sheer number of goals that Leicester have scored, because they have scored 63, but Spurs have 65 and Manchester City 66. Or how few they have let in, because while they have conceded only 33 times, Spurs have let in just 26 and Manchester United 30. It is not even the number of shots they have taken - 351 compared to a mighty 444 by Mauricio Pochettino’s men.

Instead, the bluffer can claim with total conviction, it is about when those goals have been scored, and what happened after they were scored. It is down to the 1-0 wins, a characteristic marked out long ago by Sir Alex Ferguson as a defining mark of champions.

Leicester City have kept the pursuers behind them this year with half a dozen 1-0 victories, which is to say that six goals have produced 18 insanely lucrative points. In all, Leicester have won 14 Premier League games by a single goal this season, and by contrast their closest pursuers dropped nine points from winning positions at White Hart Lane against West Brom, Arsenal, Newcastle and Stoke.

This is not mere guile on Leicester City’s part, or sustained good fortune: it is relentless determination, organisation, and belief.

Behind the top two, squabbles abound this weekend that could have profound financial implications for the clubs concerned: Norwich’s visit to Arsenal, for example. The visitors need a point - or points - to escape the bottom three, while Arsene Wenger’s side will hope for a Petr Cech shut-out and a goal from somewhere - anywhere - in pursuit of their traditional compensatory Champions’ League spot.

Bluffers will wish to point out that history is firmly in favour of the home side here: the only time that the Canaries have beaten the Gunners away in the Premier League was on the very first day of the League’s existence, in August 1992.

Meanwhile Manchester City, locked together with Arsenal on 64 points while still level pegging with Real Madrid in the Champions’ League, must concentrate on domestic matters when they travel to St Mary’s to play Europa-League-chasing Southampton.

The hosts have lost just three Premier League matches since mid-January, but City travel well to this spot on the south coast: in eleven visits they have recorded five wins and only two defeats.