5 Truths: Leicester City throw in the towel again

Of course, panic is a strong word. The draw means they are 10 points clear of a chasing pack who are more interested in scrapping with each other rather than aiming up. Chelsea dropped two points, as they did against Liverpool, but we should remember that Burnley have the fourth best home record in the league. They beat Liverpool with a ruthless counter-attacking side and also downed European-hopefuls Everton before Sunday's draw.

Burnley can damage sides with their organisation. They soak up pressure and they send the ball forward quickly when they get the chance. To go to Turf Moor, and come away with a 1-1 draw, takes Chelsea closer to the title with more than enough chances to come where three points will arrive easily. This remains Chelsea’s title to lose.

Playing a game a week means that Chelsea can run their players into the ground if they choose to. Watching Antonio Conte’s repetitive team selections, he seems to be doing just that. That’s fine, there’s plenty of time for recovery and there’s no real need to change anything.

But novelty and difference are virtues in football. Consistency is handy - it lets people on their own side know what to expect, but it works both ways. Chelsea are predictable but they are also predictably excellent. For the players, though, they are missing out on the spark of the new, of something different. Chelsea drew against Burnley and that’s a perfectly reasonable result, but Conte will have to add variety over the summer - particularly with European football to contend with - and he could be starting to prepare such a thing right now given their lead.

Obviously Claudio Ranieri should be given the chance to manage Leicester next season, if he chooses too. He has achieved too much in his first season to be given the boot in the summer. He has, despite the failure in the league, done well in the Champions League, getting into the knockout stages. The players he has bought are all perfectly sensible signings - they just have near-impossible standards to live up to.

Nevertheless, he is in danger losing the players, perhaps for good. It is not fair, and the players might share more of the blame than the manager, but this is football and it is business. It is more practical and cheaper to bin Ranieri - he will probably only get the summer and a handful of games to convince his board otherwise.

Burnley have showed they have learned from their most recent, failed stay in the Premier League. The squad has been improved, gradually, but many of the same players from three years ago are still here. It isn’t just a case of adding better players, it is that the players who were promoted have moved up to the required standards.

At home, they are organised, and they don’t sit back just for the sake of sitting back. They press when they need to, and they take their chances on the rare occasion they are offered. Wales boss Chris Coleman pointed out that Sean Dyche hadn’t just told his Burnley side to sit back in two banks of four and to hope. No, he had organised four at the back, two holding midfielders, and then drew back his wingers and strikers in to pack the midfield and also track Chelsea’s two wing-backs. They were much less strained than other clubs have been against the 3-4-3.

Three more wins should take them to safety, and they have more than enough quality, and the tactical ability, to secure it.

Alfie Mawson might be justifiably pleased with himself. He scored an impressive goal for Swansea City to kick them on to victory against Leicester City. It might be the best goal he has ever scored, and the best goal he will ever score. But he is called Alfie Mawson, and he is an English central defender who just moved from Barnsley.

Paul Pogba can dance, because he’s one of the best players in the world and, well, he can actually dance. Luckily for the Premier League, there is a generic crime of ‘bringing the game into disrepute’, which is vague enough to be brought against anyone who acts unusually but terribly. This certainly qualifies (even if it was a really, really good goal).