FILE PHOTO: Soccer Football - Premier League - Manchester City v Chelsea - Etihad Stadium, Manchester, Britain - May 21, 2023 Manchester City's Ilkay Gundogan lifts the trophy as he celebrates with team mates after winning the Premier League Action Images via Reuters/Lee Smith/File Photo
LONDON (Reuters) - Manchester City have one Premier League point less than they had after 12 games last season but according to data analysts Opta are overwhelming favourites to claim a fourth successive title.
The number crunchers at Opta Analyst have predicted where each of the 20 teams will finish the season based on 10,000 simulations of the 2023-24 campaign, based on form and remaining fixtures, fed into a supercomputer.
And the outlook looks good for Pep Guardiola's side and worryingly grim for Burnley.
City, according to Opta Analyst, have an 84.6% probability of lifting the trophy again with Liverpool given only a 9.1% chance and last season's runners-up Arsenal on 5.6%.
Back-to-back defeats for Tottenham Hotspur mean that, according to Opta, their title hopes are virtually non-existent at 0.3%, the same as Aston Villa.
Manchester United, currently in sixth place, are predicted to finish seventh and only have a 5.9% chance of finishing in the top four, although that has risen slightly of late.
Newcastle United have a 25% chance of a second-successive top-four finish while Chelsea are predicted to finish ninth.
Opta's calculations also suggest that the bottom three, currently the three clubs promoted last season, will all go down with 20th-placed Burnley given an 86.9% chance of relegation.
(Reporting by Martyn Herman; Editing by Toby Davis)
