I gamble full time so i will give you the title odds of the last 4/5 years, As much as the memory allows me to remember, The year we won the title, United were 7/4 favorites, With Chelsea 9/4 and With us at 7/2, Arsenal were 7/1, We started the season like a house on fire and it became a two horse race between us and United with them 4/9 faves and us 2/1 with Chelsea and Arsenal 8/1 each, AVB messed about and everyone knew Arsenal weren't going to win it. United remained favorites until the 6-1, Which swung the odds in our favor and we were 4/9 favorites until our little wobble where we conceded that 5 point lead. The odds for United when we got beat by Artetas goal, 1/33 to win the title that evening, Bookies say our come back to win that title made them a stack load when the rags choked.
Then came the hangover affect, The year after we won the title, We were 5/4 favorites with United around 2/1 and Chelsea at 4/1 with Arsenal at the usual 7,8/1, Then the signing of Van Persie meant we drifted out to 7/5 favorites but punters were still backing us because, That title was meant to be the start of 'City's domination of English football' . This was at a time when Sky Sports news, TalkSport etc etc were all saying 'Can't see past City for the league, They will go from strength to strength'. Fergie pissed all over their theories and did us a favor by reminding us what we want to achieve, We don't want to be the media darling, We want to be the team who is doubted but at the end of the day we want to win.
Then last year, With us coming off the back of losing the FA Cup final in such dire fashion and losing the league by a chunk of points and with the media darling coming back to manage at the bridge, and with our dave managing United, You know the guy who the media said 'He is cut from the same cloth as Fergie, I think it's a great appointment' , There was a three horse favoritism for the title, With Chelsea and us eventually breaking away, Chelsea 2/1, City 21/10 and United 9/4, Arsenal were 7/1 as usual and Liverpool were 12/1. We became hot favorites after game one, As soon as the bookies saw our thrashing of Newcastle they knew we meant business. We immediately became 13/8 faves with Chelsea at 9/4 and United 3/1. We remained favorites for virtually all of the year until we had those 3 games in hand where Chelsea had that artificial 9 point lead, The only time we genuinely were underdogs was when we drew to Sunderland, That's when Liverpool became 1/6 faves for the title, Thanks to Jose and our moneybag brothers, Our win at Crystal Palace saw us become favorites again and that was all she wrote.
This year, The media opinion is, Mourinho always wins the title in his 2nd year at clubs, Arsenal are a striker and dm away from really challenging for the title and LVG will bring in Hummels and Vidal and United will definitely fight for the title again. The media opinion is Liverpool will struggle and City are in no mans land really, Can they repeat their title success? Will their mercenaries have the hunger? They haven't bought any marquee name, Only bought players who they need and you know we're still not sure about Pellegrini, It could have been a fluke what happened last year. So in essence what i'm trying to say is the fact that we are virtually joint favorites with Chelsea tells you how much confidence the bookies have in us for next year, In reality Chelsea should be clear favorites, Arsenal joint 2nd favorite with us and United a slender fourth. The actual odds for the title are Chelsea 15/8, City 2/1, United 5/1, Arsenal 6/1, According to the media opinion and that of people on talksport and other pundits the odds should be Chelsea 6/4, Arsenal 3/1, City 3/1 and United 4/1.
