Review & Recap: Saturday’s Premier League Action

With the season winding down, 6 teams were in action in the Premier League on Saturday, with all 3 matches playing a significant role all across the table.

With just 6 matches left in the Premier League season, the races for top 4, Europa League, and relegation are reaching their climaxes. Essentially every team is desperately fighting for places, which makes each and every match a 90-minute fight to the death. On Saturday, only 3 matches took place, but all 3 were crucial in the context of individual seasons as well as league positions.

Huddersfield 1 Leicester City 4

While the Terriers’ fate has already been sealed as of last week, Leicester City continue to battle for the coveted 7th place position that would earn them a Europa League berth for next season. They’re currently in a head-lock with Wolves and Watford, while Everton and West Ham wait in the wings for their chance to pounce. This match was a must-win for the Foxes, as Huddersfield really don’t have much to play for apart from pride anymore.

Youri Tielemans continued his rejuvenation with an exceptional strike from the edge of the box in the 24th minute. His form is certain to attract some attention outside of the King Power Stadium, although I’m sure Brendan Rodgers would love to keep him around past this season.

The ever-present Jamie Vardy scored Leicester’s 2nd goal right as the 2nd half started, and although Huddersfield did pull one back, James Maddison scored a beautiful free-kick and Jamie Vardy capped off the win with a penalty kick to give Leicester the much-needed win.

Bournemouth 1 Burnley 3

For a good chunk of the season, Bournemouth were looking like a genuine contender for the 7th position, competing with the likes of Wolves and Leicester. However, since the start of the New Year especially, the Cherries have fallen off the map and are now comfortably in the bottom half of the table. Sean Dyche’s Burnley on the other hand, were among the relegation candidates all season, and although they have pulled away from the pack a bit of late, they still aren’t quite safe.

An unfortunate Ashley Barnes own-goal gifted the hosts an early lead, but Burnley took immense advantage of their aerial prowess and Bournemouth’s error-prone defence to score twice and take the lead before the 20th minute. Barnes reversed his early mistake by finishing off Bournemouth in the 2nd half, as Burnley rose to 14th in the Premier League table, 2 points back of the Cherries.

Newcastle 0 Crystal Palace 1

With the bottom 3 almost set in stone, you could probably now say that both Crystal Palace and Newcastle are safe in terms of relegation. That doesn’t mean that they aren’t still desperate for a higher position in the Premier League though, and these two sides displayed that with a physical, tightly-knit clash at St. James’ Park.

There wasn’t much to talk about in terms of match plot, but Luka Milivojevic did step up to the penalty spot as he always does, to give Crystal Palace a late victory.

Milivojevic has now scored an astonishing 10 Premier League goals this season, with each and every one of them coming from the penalty spot! Palace moved into 12th place, while Newcastle allowed Burnley to leapfrog them in the Premier League table.