The 20th round of the Premier League will be contested at the weekend, the first round of the second half of the season. At present, Liverpool is the halfway title with 42 points, followed by Arsenal with 2 points, Aston Villa 3 points behind, and Manchester City 5 points behind with a game in hand, and the competition for the Premier League title is quite fierce.
CCTV will broadcast two Premier League games live, at 11 p.m. on Saturday, CCTV5 will broadcast Manchester City's home game against Sheffield United, and at 10 p.m. on Sunday, CCTV5+ will broadcast Arsenal's away challenge to Fulham, fans and friends should not miss it.
Manchester City, who have just won the Club World Cup, are currently playing one game less, but they are not too many points behind. In their first game with the World Championship stamp, Manchester City beat Everton and took all three points. However, it was City's second win in the last seven Premier League games. Pep Guardiola's team hopes to use their status as world champions to inspire players to quickly get out of the doldrums and challenge for the Premier League title.
When Haaland and De Bruyne will return to the team remains a top concern for fans, with Pep Guardiola saying that Haaland is not as thin and small as Foden, so his bones are under a lot of pressure and recovery is difficult. Kevin De Bruyne will need to be more careful and try to avoid coming in too early and causing another injury. The two are doing quite well and may soon see their return.
Without Haaland, City will not be short of goals, with Alvarez and Foden showing good form. In this round of games, Manchester City will face Sheffield United at home and must try to win. Four months ago, Haaland missed a penalty, but thanks to Rodri's late goal, City narrowly won the game. Over the past four years, including the FA Cup, Manchester City have beaten their opponents six times in a row, and it should not be too difficult to continue the winning results.
Arsenal lost to West Ham by two goals at home in the past game, and it is worth mentioning that since Moyes led a number of teams to the Premier League, he faced Manchester United, Liverpool, Arsenal and Chelsea, four traditional giants, a total of 73 games, with a record of 1 win, 21 draws and 51 losses. The win over Arsenal was Moyes' first away win over all four teams in the Premier League.
Against West Ham, Arsenal had the upper hand in terms of stats, with a total of 30 shots on goal and nothing on target. On the other hand, West Ham only had 6 shots on goal in the whole game, but scored two goals, especially the first goal, which filled everyone with reverie, Bowen at the moment of passing, did the ball go out of bounds?
Either way, Arsenal can't change the outcome of the defeat and boss Mikel Arteta has vowed that if 30 shots are not enough, we will try to reach 50, or even 60, and are quite happy with the current position of the team. It's just that, including the Champions League, Arsenal has won only 1 of its last 5 games, and the sluggish form is worrying.
In this round of games, Arsenal challenged Fulham away, the situation between the two sides was one-sided, the past 10 Premier League games, Arsenal won 8 games, but the first round of the game, but not in these 8 games, Fulham at the end of the game, successfully equalized the score, and brought a point home. Arsenal need to improve their goal scoring efficiency if they want to beat their opponents, and it is not enough to thunder and not rain, so does Kai Havertz have to work harder?
The two Premier League games that CCTV chose to broadcast live should be worth looking forward to, and they are also the beginning of the Premier League title competition. After this round of fixtures, the Premier League will enter a "winter break" of rotational rest, strictly speaking, there is only one Premier League game in January, and the other is scheduled for the handover in January and February. There are also FA Cup round of 64 and round of 32 fixtures for teams without League Cup mandates. Whether Manchester City can strike later, and whether Arsenal will habitually "drop the chain", everyone can wait and see.