Man City seal fourth spot, Arsenal pile misery on Spurs

Sports Sunday 15/May/2016 21:43 PM
By: Times News Service
Man City seal fourth spot, Arsenal pile misery on Spurs

London: Manchester City drew 1-1 at Swansea City to finish fourth in the Premier League and Arsenal overhauled their arch-rivals Tottenham Hotspur to come second on a dramatic final day of the season on Sunday.
After Manchester United's game against Bournemouth was abandoned due to a security alert at Old Trafford, Arsenal crushed relegated Aston Villa 4-0 and Spurs capitulated 5-1 at 10-man Newcastle United to blow their chance of finishing above their neighbours for the first time since 1995.
Champions Leicester City drew 1-1 at Chelsea to end the campaign 10 points ahead of the chasing pack, another staggering achievement in a remarkable season for Claudio Ranieri's team.
Manchester City needed a point to make sure of claiming the final Champions League qualifying spot but their game at Swansea started in a strange atmosphere caused by the events at Old Trafford.
Two stands were evacuated 20 minutes before kickoff and the game was abandoned shortly before the scheduled 1400 GMT start. A controlled explosion was later carried out on a suspect package.
Manchester City made the perfect start when Kelechi Iheanacho fired them ahead after five minutes.
Swansea equalised on the stroke of halftime through Andre Ayew's deflected free kick and the visitors endured a few nervy moments in Manuel Pellegrini's last match in charge before celebrating the point they needed.
Spurs, Leicester's closest challengers in the last few weeks, endured a dismal afternoon at relegated Newcastle.
Georginio Wijnaldum and Aleksandar Mitrovic put the hosts 2-0 up at halftime before Erik Lamela pulled one back.
Mitrovic was shown a straight red card for a dangerous foul but Wijnaldum scored his second from the penalty spot and Rolando Aarons and Daryl Janmaat completed the scoring at St James' Park.
Arsenal took an early lead against Villa through Olivier Giroud and the French striker added two late goals to complete his hat-trick before Mark Bunn's stoppage-time own goal completed the rout.
Cesc Fabregas's second-half penalty for Chelsea looked set to condemn Leicester to only their fourth defeat of the season but Danny Drinkwater rescued a point for the champions with a stunning long-distance strike.
Southampton climbed to fifth with a 4-1 victory over FA Cup finalists Crystal Palace and West Ham United's hopes of a top-six finish ended following a 2-1 loss at Stoke City.