Not only was a World Cup parked midway through this football season but — more importantly — it was a campaign of great change in social-media algorithms. The hunt for engagement has never been so furious.
Some of the likes-gathering community have reacted in a dishonest way, shifting to a not-exactly-true model, an impressions-first economy. Given the fact that many millions have consumed this content it feels almost ungracious to confirm that, no, Arsenal were not 11 points clear with a game in hand when they signed Jorginho. And, yes, Ederson has conceded a direct free-kick goal in his career. And no, Trent Alexander-Arnold does not have the second-highest number of goals from direct free kicks in Premier League history.
But even if accuracy has gone out of the window since last August, you can't fault the enthusiasm — 28 per cent of all conversation (an estimated figure) in England is based around ranking football clubs and football players above or below a set of arbitrary expectations.
Every single season since the sport was first codified and released into the Victorian wild has seen people build entire evenings around fervently-held beliefs that may or may not be backed up by evidence.
So, as we are into the final week of the 2022-23 Premier League, let's take an evidence-based look at some of its main talking points and come up with some objective verdicts.
Elsewhere on The Athletic…
Did Arsenal bottle the league?
The most incessant talking point in the closing weeks of the season has concerned Arsenal's failure to turn a promising lead at the top of the table into their first title since 2003-04.
January 1: Arsenal were seven points clear of Manchester City.
February 1: Arsenal were five points clear of City, with a game in hand.
March 1: Arsenal were five points clear of City.
April 1: Arsenal were eight points clear of City, having played a game more than them.
May 1: Arsenal were a point behind City, having played a game more.
May 20: City won their third successive league title after Arsenal lost away at Nottingham Forest.
Nobody is sure whether TS Eliot was an Arsenal supporter, but his catchphrase 'April is the cruellest month!' was surely written with them and the 2022-23 Premier League in mind. The defeat away at City on April 26 was Arsenal's only loss of the month but it was the three successive draws with Liverpool, West Ham United and Southampton that preceded that trip to the Etihad which did for them. Vital points were thrown away from leading positions, plus an incalculable psychological impact that affected Arsenal in other games in the run-in.
There's no avoiding the reality that Mikel Arteta's side have set a new record for days spent top of the Premier League without actually securing the title. The fact they have overtaken Newcastle in 1995-96, hitherto the chastened poster boys of title-bid disintegration, is telling. That there are three Arsenal entries in the top six of this category also adds weight to the idea that — as successful a club as they are — they do always have a meltdown in them.
Looking back at some of the others, the 189 days Arsenal spent top of the 2002-03 Premiership (sic) is a particularly painful memory, because there's little doubt Arsene Wenger's team were the best in the division that year, and ceding the title to Manchester United prevented them achieving a deserved three-in-a-row.
But perhaps the 141 days Liverpool were in first place in 2018-19 offers some hope for this Arsenal side. Jurgen Klopp's men went toe-to-toe with Manchester City that year, recorded a monumental points tally (see section below), but still didn't get to lift the trophy. What they did do, though, was come back the following season and make good on their promise, winning the club's first domestic title for 30 years. Something for Arsenal to aim for next season, when their championship drought ticks up to 20 years…
VERDICT: Yes, but progress all the same.
Are required points totals experiencing hyperinflation in the Guardiola era?
One argument that has been deployed in Arsenal's defence when it comes to not winning the league is that, these days, teams have to aim for extreme points totals, with the division stretched out like warm mozzarella. And that assertion is backed up by the numbers, with the 15 highest points totals not to win the English top flight all coming since 2004-05, four of them by clubs who came third.
The 2004-05 season was Jose Mourinho's first at Chelsea and defending champions Arsenal recorded 83 points to come second. Mikel Arteta's team will surpass that total if they beat visitors Wolverhampton Wanderers on Sunday, but that would still only draw them level with Liverpool's haul in 2013-14, another surprise title challenge that couldn't quite get over the line. In this context, Arsenal's points figure this season is decent enough, but not outstanding.
Tottenham in 2016-17 surely had more reason for frustration than Arsenal this season. Mauricio Pochettino's side not only came second with 86 points but also ended the season having scored the division's most goals and conceded the fewest, one of only two times that has happened in English top-flight history to a team who didn't finish first. North London truly does revel in a painful denouement.
There's also the notion that Manchester City's fearsome run of league wins (currently 12 and counting) is a sinister new development, a robot result-army who cannot be defeated by mere humans. But the truth is that long winning streaks became a top-flight reality in England during the 1980s, slowed down a bit in the 1990s (although Arsenal put together a 10-game run of victories to secure the title in 1997-98) before exploding in the 2000s and beyond. That said, there's little doubt modern-era City have perfected the art form. They are responsible for six of the last 10 runs of 10-plus Premier League wins in a row. Perhaps one day they will simply win every game forever, but we are not at that point yet.
VERDICT: It's an issue… but other clubs have had it worse in the past than Arsenal have in 2022-23.
Are two-goal leads becoming more dangerous?
Look, I'm not happy about it, but I will always respect the data.
First, please remember that the one-goal lead will always be nature's most dangerous in a game of football.
As you can see in the table below, throughout Premier League history the rate that teams have failed to win when leading by a single goal is around 50 per cent. There's seasonal variation, but not too much.
It's a different story with the much-feared/rarely studied two-goal advantage, though. Purists will enjoy the 2005-06 season, the very height of the Mourinho/Rafa Benitez defensive-priest era, which so angered Jorge Valdano. That season saw only two instances of a team blowing a two-goal lead in the entire season. Professional, enjoyable, relatable.
Sadly though, sensationalists will always prefer the drama of an advantage being frittered away and on that basis they must be loving 2022-23. It's second only to 2015-16 for proportion of games where two-goal leads have been wasted, and it already beats every previous Premier League campaign for total wins by teams who were two down in the game (six).
Something to bear in mind as we prepare for a three-way relegation battle on the final day.
VERDICT: Two goal leads have (momentarily) become (a bit more) dangerous
Should we ban managers from talking about 'the 40-point mark'?
A lot of the claims in this article come from us fans, but the sanctity of the 40-point safety mark is hard-coded into all Premier League managers. They simply will not let it go.
Maybe it's the round number that appeals. It's hard to turn, say, the number 37 into a rallying call for a group of players facing an arduous season in arguably the toughest league in the world.
But it might be nice this summer for a forward-thinking manager to just come out and tell his team something like, “Guys, it's unlikely we'll even need 1.05 points per game to stay up, so just relax and play your football; 38 draws will do me!”
1.05 points is, of course, what 40 points across a 38-game season works out as. Annoyingly, English football has not always had a 20-team top division. It didn't even start relegating three clubs per season until 1973-74 and it didn't begin awarding three points for a win until 1981-82. Ever heard about this cool thing called uniformity, lads?
Anyway, you can see in the chart below how the points-per-game rate required to stay up has steadily declined over time, reaching an all-time low of 0.76 in 2020-21.
With their current points totals, Everton, Leicester City and Leeds United would all have been safe two years ago. Sadly for them, it is not two years ago.
VERDICT: The phrase should be ditched, but never will be
Can you concede loads and stay up?
Talking of the relegation battle, English football history is on line two with some concerning news for Leeds.
As it stands, Leeds have let in 74 goals this season, four more than any other side — unsurprising, given they conceded 23 goals in April alone, which is an all-time Premier League record for a single calendar month.
The problem they face is that, in the Premier League era, the team who let in the most goals always goes down. Not since Crystal Palace in 1989-90 has a team with the outright* worst defence in the English top flight not been relegated.
Palace's total of 66 goals conceded that year was distended by a 9-0 defeat to Liverpool at Anfield, which is neat because Bournemouth are the team nearest to Leeds this season for goals conceded (70), having lost by the same scoreline at the same venue this season.
But this doesn't help Leeds at all, because if Bournemouth concede more than four goals on the final day it will be Everton who have scored them; so unless Gary O'Neil's team win 6-5 at Goodison Park, it would surely be dire news for Leeds' survival hopes all the same.
VERDICT: Leeds to fall foul of one of modern football's iron rules
*Fulham in 2006-07 and West Ham in 2017-18 had the joint-worst defences that season and didn't go down. Well done.
Has 2022-23 been the season of crazy scorelines?
There have been no 6-5 results so far this season, but we've been treated to a solid spread of scorelines all the same. The annual 9-0 defeat for a south-coast team, Manchester United losing 7-0 for only the fourth time in their history, plus a load of tennis scores.
But with less than a week to go, 2022-23 still trails 2009-10 by one in terms of unique scorelines and it would be fitting, in a season where so many teams have forgotten how to defend, to equal the record on Sunday. What do you fancy? A now-rarer-than-the-nine-nil 4-4? A Mourinho-hockey-heritage 5-4? The first 6-6 in the top flight since 1930?
VERDICT: I'd 8-2 not see an exciting last day of the season on Sunday
Should Erling Haaland have equalled Dixie Dean's 63-goal season?
Yeah, he blew it. What a waste.
VERDICT: Haaland must console himself with being the first Golden Boot/league title combo winner since Robin van Persie in 2012-13.
(Main graphic — photos: Getty Images/design: Samuel Richardson)