#3 Manchester United, 2011/12
2011/12 was the closest Premier League title race of all time as it’s the only season that it came down to goal difference – Manchester City won out after a last-minute Sergio Aguero winner on the final day against QPR allowed them to pull level with local rivals United, but because they’d scored 93 goals to United’s 89 – including six against United themselves in a shock 1-6 away win – the title went to Eastlands.
Interestingly enough, United’s top scorer Wayne Rooney actually outscored City’s top scorer Aguero by 27 goals to 23, but the difference seemed to be the rest of the squads – City had another two players in double figures in Edin Dzeko and Mario Balotelli, while United’s other forwards Javier Hernandez and Dimitar Berbatov only managed 17 between them.
If it’s goals you’re after, then there would be no better player to plug into that hole than Messi, who has never scored less than 20 league goals in a season since 2007/08. In 2011/12, for instance, he managed to hit a crazy 50 goals in 37 league games. The only man to ever match that for United was Cristiano Ronaldo, and the year he did so was in 2007/08 at United, who, of course, won the league.
Put Messi and his goals into the 2011/12 Manchester United side and would City have ever come close to beating them to take the Premier League? I don’t think so.
