Manchester City Fan View: Champions-elect must keep Premier League records in sights

Manchester City stand on the verge of winning the Premier League title. It’s been apparent since around October that Pep Guardiola’s men will be lifting the trophy aloft in May, and downright obvious since mid-December. From the start of 2018 it’s been nothing short of a procession towards making it official, and it will be confirmed imminently.

Prior to the weekend fixtures, City were four wins away from cementing their status as Champions of England. That’s now been cut down to three wins without the Blues even playing – they face Stoke City on Monday night to complete the weekend’s fixtures.

Manchester United’s victory over Liverpool reduced the requirements for City to wrap it up all up. Crucially for the Sky Blues’ supporters, it has opened up the possibility of a significant milestone. In three games’ time, City are the hosts in the Manchester derby. If they can maintain a perfect record in that time, they will win the league against Manchester United. By beating one hated rival, United have opened themselves up to humiliation against another.

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That, and other milestones, must now be their motivation. Winning the league itself can no longer motivate them, for it is simply inevitable. Winning it against United absolutely has to be the next aim. To get to that point, the Blues need to beat Stoke on Monday and then see off Everton at Goodison Park in a fortnight.

Sealing the deal against United would mean the world to City fans. To know that United – the fans that most enjoyed kicking dirt in the face of a club that was down-and-out in very recent history – were there to witness the occasion would be the sweetest gift this season could offer. Pleasingly, it would be the earliest date the Premier League has been won, taking the record from United themselves.

They’d have no choice but to watch it and drink it in, and we’d probably never see anything like it ever again. It would be stupendous.

From there, there will be more records to topple. The most points ever accrued in the Premier League era is 95, which was done by Mourinho’s Chelsea. City are currently on 78 points with 27 to play for, meaning they’re playing to finish with a total of 105 points. They can afford to lose and draw a game and still finish with three figures in the points column. They can drop a whopping nine points and still take the record.

What about the record number of goals scored? That one also belongs to Chelsea, though it is Carlo Ancelloti’s iteration that hold that crown. City are on 83, averaging 2.89 goals per game. 21 more goals will see them smash that record, and they only need to average 2.33 per game to do it. 100 goals seems to be almost guaranteed and the record is achievable.

The final record to aim for is the biggest winning points margin. That stands at 18. A win on Monday night would City’s 16 point gap to United and make the record highly attainable.

When the title is won, Guardiola will no doubt start rotating the squad to keep them fresh for the Champions League pursuit. The midweek defeat to FC Basel was evidence that you can’t make wholesale changes and maintain the same fluidity. Hunting down records should be the inspiration for Pep and his team to keep all guns blazing on the home straight.

City are the Premier League Champions elect. They mustn’t settle for that – they must immortalise themselves in football history as the greatest Champions of all time.