EPL Monday: Chelsea's Title March Slowed; Jozy Altidore Shows Up; Decoding Steven Gerrard's Instagram

Is the EPL title race back?

That’s obviously getting ahead way ahead things, however Chelsea was held to a scoreless draw with Sunderland and Manchester City beat Southampton 3-0, moving within six points of the apparent champions-elect who top the table with 33 points after 13 matches. So yeah, nominally, so it’s fair to call this a race without needing to put the word race within quotations marks like previous installments of this column.

If there’s a bold, declarative statement to be made from these results, it is that Southampton, previously in second place, is due for a slide down the table. The club had allowed only six goals in its previous 12 matches meaning a return to normalcy is due for the Saints once they begin playing the EPL’s better teams. If Southampton, still in third with 26 points, continues to slide it’ll bust the Champions League race wide-open with two spots seemingly up for grabs for about a half-dozen teams. Southampton still possesses enough quality where it could still hang around the top six or seven all season, but retaining the No. 2 position as we hit 2015 is and was a bit unrealistic. Morgan Schneiderlin, possibly Southampton’s most-important player, left the match vs. City at halftime and the extent of his adductor is yet unknown.

As for Chelsea and City? The Blues were probably due for a rare hiccup. Sunderland, in what will likely be the club’s best result of the season, played smart, defended deep and limited most of Chelsea’s attempts on goal from long range. There’s no sense over-reacting to one isolated 0-0 result unlike some other clubs in the EPL since Chelsea has played so well through 2014. Moreso, if Chelsea won it would have put Jose Mourinho’s team in line for one of the highest point totals after 13 games in league history, which emphasizes just how well this team is playing at the moment.

City perhaps might find a little more encouragement since it followed up its comeback against Bayern Munich in the Champions League with an important road win in the EPL on Sunday. Yaya Toure put together his most productive game of the season and if he gets it going again, obviously City is a much more dynamic team and less-reliant on Sergio Agüero’s heroics every match.

Also heroic (in the sporting sense of the word) is Frank Lampard. The former Chelsea stalwart scored his third goal for City on Sunday and is playing so well there is talk about extending his loan/delaying his debut for Manchester City’s MLS expansion franchise, NYCFC. If you saw this development coming, your name is obviously Biff Tannen. As it stands Lampard is tied with Stevan Jovetic and Yaya Toure for second-place in the City goal-scoring charts behind Agüero’s 12. For comparison a season ago when City won the league Toure led the club with 20 goals, followed by 17 from Agüero and 16 from Edin Dzeko.

Elsewhere Arsenal did enough to get a 1-0 result vs. West Brom thanks to Santi Carzola and Danny Welbeck hooking up on a classic cross-header combination. Like City, the Gunners put some poor results in the background with a win in the Champions League and a win in EPL play back-to-back. Of course ethe continual Arsenal dilemma — good enough to finish fourth, but not win the league, continues but things look much sunnier today than they did a week ago.

Building Steam with a Grain of Silverado:

Chevy, apparently, is trying hard to appeal to directly to me since it’s sponsoring a soccer team (Manchester United) and now using DJ Shadow songs from the 90s to hawk its automobiles. Lately it seems like every single EPL commercial break on NBC features the ad with the song, “Building Steam with a Grain of Salt.” For the purposes of this blog post, that phrasing can apply to the current form of Manchester United under Louis Van Gaal, which is up to fourth in the table thanks to a 3-0 win over Hull City at Old Trafford. This was the most “vintage” United performance we’ve seen this year, as the Red Devils finished with 76 percent possession and brushed aside a bottom-table team with Sir Alex Ferguson-like ease..

Losing Angel Di Maria to a hamstring injury midway through the first half puts a damper on the game, but United do still have Juan Mata and Ander Herrera among others in reserve. Credit van Gaal for steering United through injury-after-injury this year and finding a balanced team with Marouane Fellaini and Michael Carrick anchored in the center of the midfield. It helped Saturday was one of those afternoons where Wayne Rooney and Robin van Persie (more on the Dutchman below) reminded the world of their lofty reputations.

Apologies for this semi-dumb comparison, but Manchester United so far have felt a lot like a video game squad — a lot of random (albeit good) players thrown together without much rhyme or reason. Finding and establishing the chemistry and combinations that work is taking time, but we’re seeing hints at the very-high potential.

United’s only loss since Oct. 5 came to Manchester City and included in that span is a draw with Chelsea and win over Arsenal. United’s December schedule is manageable vs. Stoke; at Southampton; vs. Liverpool; at Aston Villa; vs. Newcastle United and at Spurs.

Hey Jozy:

Maybe fans of the United States Men’s National Team can band together and petition so that Jozy Altidore only plays games against Chelsea. For whatever odd reason the American striker is a punchline vs. 18 other EPL teams, but useful vs. Chelsea. Altidore scored his first (and only) league goal last December vs. Chelsea and also drew a penalty earlier this year vs. the Blues in April that helped send Mourinho to his first EPL loss at Stamford Bridge. Saturday Altidore came on as a sub and was effective in Sunderland’s 0-0 draw, even if he didn’t score despite a couple decent chances, including a chance denied by Thibaut Courtois in the 82nd minute.

Overall Altidore’s season is still one to forget at Sunderland, where manager Gus Poyet doesn’t seem to rate him and he’s fallen behind Steven Fletcher and Connor Wickham on the depth chart. He’s only played 109 minutes, completing just over 50 percent of his passes without a goal.

Sunderland spent $13 million on him back in the summer of 2013 from AZ, so it’s doubtful they’d want to sell him off at a reduced price, despite his shockingly poor goal-scoring ability at the Stadium of Light. Unless the club finds another striker it’s doubtful Altidore will be shipped out on-loan in January, although I’d guess there’d be a line of clubs in the Championship (English second division) lining up to add him if Sunderland went that route despite his limitations in EPL play. Altidore showed at AZ and (occasionally) with the USMNT that he is capable of scoring goals, but as has always been the case in his career it’s about finding the right spot.

Captain my Captain:

Saturday was the 16th anniversary of Steven Gerrard’s debut for Liverpool’s senior team, however the Reds captain began the eventual 1-0 win over Stoke City on the bench. Given Gerrard’s age (34), current form and lack of a natural position in Brendan Rodgers lineup, this isn’t too crazy, is it? Being how the media works, there were numerous reports of a “rift” between Rodgers and Gerrard.

Sunday morning Gerrard took to Instagram and posted an “AG” — all good — update, writing in the caption: “Just to set the record straight media talk of a fall out between us 2 is NONSENSE ..have a nice Sunday ?#together#solid#ynwa”

Does this clear anything up? Does it change anything? Does it matter?

Handling a star player nearing the end of their career, or at least their peak isn’t easy in any sport or situation. Triple or quadruple that with Gerrard and Liverpool, whom in so many ways is the heartbeat of the club. It doesn’t behoove Liverpool or Gerrard to make this transition any rockier than it has to be going forward. From afar it’s easy to say, throw him on the bench and don’t think twice but when you think about living, breathing human beings made of flesh and bone like everyone else, it’s not nearly as simple. Is it really worth souring the relationship at the end?

If Gerrard’s performance warrants a place in the XI, by all means play him but he shouldn’t automatically be the first name written down by Rodgers at the moment (fair question: which Liverpool player would be on current form?) based on past performance. Compounding issues for Liverpool is there isn’t exactly a player screaming out to play in place of Gerrard, although perhaps summer signing Emre Can deserves a longer look.

There isn’t a perfect solution here, shockingly, in spite of social media updates — Monday Rodgers said the club offered Gerrard a new contract. Compromises will be needed for all parties, lest an actual, nasty rift/fall out develops. Liverpool needs this additional headache right now about as much as an asshole on an elbow, so to speak.

Getting ahead:

Glen Johnson helped Liverpool, temporarily, stop its skid by scoring the only goal in a 1-0 win over Stoke on Saturday. For his troubles Johnson received a kick in the head while nodding the ball over the line, which resulted in on-field temporary staples.

Goal of the Week:

Sometimes Robin van Persie sticks out his left foot and this sort of thing happens.

Stat of the Week:

Spurs paid $30+ million for Roberto Soldado last summer from Valencia, too. That’s good transfer market-ing. Sarcasm aside, the goal lifted Spurs to a 2-1 win over Everton, putting them only two points off Manchester United in fourth.

Non-Call of the Week:

Diego Costa was quite fortunate his boot didn’t connect with John O’Shea’s face, no? Costa still picked up a yellow card later in the match — his fifth of the season — and will have to sit out due to accumulation in Chelsea’s next match which comes on Wednesday vs. Tottenham.

Looking Ahead:

The crowded month of December gets going with games on Tuesday and Wednesday. Chelsea/Spurs and Arsenal/Southampton on Wednesday are the picks of the round.

RELATED: Kevin Mirallas, Christian Eriksen Traded Great Goals in Tottenham-Everton Match

[Photos via Getty]