NOS Football•today, 1:26 PM
The last block of this Premier League season starts tomorrow. No longer hindered by international interruptions, the Dutch football competition is hurtling at a rapid pace towards the apotheosis. There are still eight rounds left, some of which will be completed midweek and will only be briefly interrupted by the cup final on April 21.
The champion seems to be certain: PSV has not lost a league match this season and is ten points ahead of pursuer Feyenoord. Has the tension disappeared from the Premier League? Certainly not. There is still a lot to be gained and lost in various areas.
This is the program for next weekend.
It hasn’t happened since 2018: a championship for PSV. The people of Eindhoven had to watch passively as Ajax (three times) and Feyenoord (once) won the national titles since then. This season that seems to be changing, in an impressive way.
PSV is still in the race for some illustrious records. The most striking feature is the all-time points record in an Eredivisie season. Converted to three points for a victory, this is 93 and was achieved by Ajax in the 1971/72 season.
If the Eindhoven team wins the rest of their Premier League matches, they will end this season on 96 points. So they can even afford a draw to grab the points record.
Bosz does not suffer from championship fever: ‘We are busy with NEC’
Furthermore, this PSV can become the second team ever to remain undefeated for an entire season, after Louis van Gaal’s Ajax in 1994/95. In addition, the Eindhoven team was only 85 minutes behind in the entire season. The record? 105 minutes, established by Ajax in 1982/83.
Extremely exciting top scorer battle
Who can join a list with Marco van Basten, Romário and Luis Suárez? The top scorer battle is still wide open with three strikers who are neck and neck. Vangelis Pavlidis (AZ, 23 goals), Luuk de Jong (PSV, 22) and Santiago Gimenez (Feyenoord, 21) are all still major contenders.
Pavlidis and Gimenez got off to a good start this season, but have started scoring less regularly in recent months. De Jong has actually increased the pace and nestled between the two other top scorers. What do the figures from statistics agency Opta tell us?
This shows that De Jong has the most Expected Goals, a statistic that indicates how many goals a player’s shots should have scored according to an advanced and widely used algorithm.
The highest shot conversion belongs to Vangelis Pavlidis, who also exceeds his Expected Goals total by the most with his ‘real’ goals.
Does that perhaps mean that the AZ striker, if given the right opportunities, is the biggest contender for the top scorer title? The last eight rounds will tell.
Struggle for survival
The Premier League is now saying goodbye to the clubs that finish in the bottom two places: they are immediately relegated to the first division. The team that finishes sixteenth may try to maintain itself through play-offs.
What are the chances of the teams at the bottom? Opta unleashed its algorithms: the Premier League was simulated a thousand times and on this basis it was determined what percentage chance each club had of finishing in a certain place. It turns out: FC Volendam (82.2%) and Vitesse (70.8%) seem to be condemned to the places they are now.
Also interesting: the battle for sixteenth place. At the moment, RKC Waalwijk has more claim to direct enforcement than Excelsior, which is assigned a 50 percent chance of finishing sixteenth. While both clubs currently have the same number of points.
Will Ajax soon be cheering for Feyenoord?
Not only do the places in the play-offs for relegation still have to be divided, but the play-offs for European football are also being played. A rather curious situation arises there.
Ajax is currently fifth, a place that would condemn the Amsterdam team to these play-offs. A setback for the Amsterdam team, who usually qualify directly for European tournaments. That is still possible, although help from Feyenoord is welcome.
Feyenoord will play the cup final against NEC on April 21. The winner of that match will receive a ticket for the group stage of the Europa League. However, Feyenoord will most likely receive a European ticket due to the final ranking in the Premier League.
If Feyenoord wins the cup final, the European ticket will move to number five in the Premier League rankings. And that is currently Ajax. In that respect, the Amsterdammers must hope that their arch-rival wins the cup this year.
