To be fair many City fans thought after 5 games, and Chelseas poor start, we would win it. What we, and the press did not realise that start was then followed by a lack of application and attitude. Im not one to defend the press but I dont think anyone could have predicted how Citys season would unravel
Like you, I don't think there is an orchestrated campaign against City, but I do think that many sports opinion writers (and, by extension, their papers) do have an obvious leaning away from City. Looking on newsnow, I came across this headline from the Star:
Ozil, Lallana and Lamella make list of best attacking midfielders on stats. There then followed the 'top' 12, as reported by football-observatory.com. I clicked the link as, not only was I surprised to see Lallana and Lamella on it, I wondered if Merlin might have scraped in given that he's not had a great season by his standards and has had a few injuries.
The PL had six representatives, who were listed as follows: 9th Payet, 8th Lallana, 7th Ericsson, 4th Lamella, 2nd Ozil, 1st David Silva.
Now, you could easily argue, that it's not much of a story. But, if you're going to bother with it, I'd have thought the story was more about the number 1 ranked player is playing in the PL. It might, at a push, have been about having 2 players from the PL in the top 2. But to not mention he bloke who's ranked first seems like a bit more than an oversight.