Sir Alex and the Holy Grail of 100 points

15Jan 2013

Premier League

Another week, another Manchester United win, and Sir Alex Ferguson's grip on regaining the Premier League title looks even tighter. But Ralph Ellis believes there is still some value to be found backing them if you know where to look...

It was on December 29 when Sir Alex Ferguson told the world that his current squad is: "as good as any I have had in my time at Old Trafford."

He made the claim in his programme notes before a routine 2-0 win over West Brom, and it didn't go down too well with some of the players from the last 20 years. There were mutterings and murmurings of dissent, mention of the great names, of Cantona, Beckham, Ronaldo; and especially of the 1999 treble side who could bring on super subs like Teddy Sheringham and Ole Gunnar Solksjaer.

But wind the clock forward a few weeks and maybe he has got a point, and not just because beating Liverpool yesterday maintained United's seven point advantage over City at the top of the Barclays Premier League table.

The result took Fergie's side to 55 points from their 22 games - an average of 2.5 per match. Maintain that for the rest of the season and they will finish with 95 points, and match the biggest total ever gained by any champions since the division was reduced to 38 games in 1995-6 (Chelsea did it in 2005).

In fact for all United's dominance in that time they have only twice achieved 90 points or more - in 2000 when, armed with the confidence of conquering Europe and with very few injury problems, they dominated the domestic scene to get their best ever haul of 91. They repeated the trick in 2009 when a 1-0 win at Hull on the final day of the season took their final tallyto 90.

It's a significant stat because even Arsenal's 2004 Invincibles didn't get more than 90 points. And Fergie being Fergie, you can bet he's got half an eye on beating Jose Mourinho's 2005 haul before he calls it a day, and so making sure there's not a single Premier League record he doesn't hold.

Is the Holy Grail of a 100 point season possible? It would mean dropping only three points between now and the end of the season so that might be a bit of a stretch. But with players like Nemanja Vidic and Phil Jones returning from injury it's not impossible.

United's problem for the first half of the season has been a failure to keep clean sheets and that was still the case against Liverpool. But Vidic has already begun to improve things, and with the attacking options unchanged and Robin Van Persie in such devastating form then it's hard to see why they wouldn't keep improving in the second half of the season.

Of course there's not much value left in simply backing them to win the Premier League now - down to 1.39. But the prospect of a record points haul raises some other possibilities. I rather like the 3.65 still on offer about United winning Betfair's Handicap League. It doesn't need West Brom, Everton or Swansea to tail off very much in the second half of the season and United could run away with that one as clearly as they seem to be doing in the Premier League itself.

Odds-against - currently 2.66 - for United/Robin Van Persie in the Winner/Top Goalscorer market looks a good thing too.

Plenty might disagree with Sir Alex's glowing assessment of the strength of his current squad. But there are signs that the record books might end up supporting his judgement.