At the beginning of the season no one saw Liverpool coming, they played badly and at a time was battling to move to the big six, it was all Manchester city and Arsenal.
Now Liverpool sit 5 points clear of Arsenal and Manchester city with Aston villa their closest rivals.
I think in terms of consistency Liverpool are better than Arsenal and has a better chance of maintaining the top spot and would be Manchester city main adversary to them defending their premier league title.
Arsenal are very unfortunate. From 1st place they have to go down to 4th place and have the opportunity to go down to 5th place. Liverpool from the first PL match this season was immediately challenged by Chelsea, even though the result was 1-1 consistently, they could slowly be at the top of the standings.
Arsenal's consistency is in doubt from season to season and Arsenal is in doubt from competing for the title this time.
Aston Villa's consistency has also not been tested, maybe this season they will be serious competitors against Liverpool and Manchester City in the competition for the Premier League title after they last won this trophy in the 1980/1981 season. Or Aston Villa this season will be runners up after the last time they were in the 1992/1993 season.
Arsenal's performance has suddenly deteriorated. We saw this last season as well. Despite performing brilliantly throughout the season, Arsenal team failed to win the title due to poor performances and dropping points in the last few matches. Arsenal's situation is similar this season. They have won only one of their last 5 matches. And they have lost points in the last three matches. It is not possible to become Premier League champions with such erratic performances.
Aston Villa team is playing very well. However, I don't think this team deserves to win the Premier League title right now. Second place in the table is now against Aston Villa with 42 points from 20 matches. However, there is a strong possibility that this group will lose the truck and fall behind at any time. Villa players did not play well against Sheffield United and Manchester United. If they play well in these two matches, the top spot in the table would be occupied by Villa.