Premier League's Biggest Time Wasters This Season as Newcastle Among the Most Notorious

• The Premier League’s biggest time-wasters have been revealed via some interesting stats
• Newcastle are ironically the biggest culprit despite Eddie Howe’s complaint about Arsenal
• Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City are the EPL side that has the ball in play for the most time

Interesting data has exposed Newcastle United as the biggest time-wasters in the Premier League this season.

The Magpies, under coach Eddie Howe, have been a force to be reckoned with and are well on course to qualifying for the Champions League.

Their brilliance came into play once again on May 7, albeit via defeat against title hopefuls, Arsenal, who emerged with a 2-0 win under difficult circumstances at St James’ Park.

After the game, Eddie Howe was critical of the Gunners as he claimed they had resorted to gamesmanship and time-wasting to take the edge from the home side.

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However, if stats from Opta Analyst are anything to go by, Newcastle could be slammed for double standards as the numbers suggest they have been masters of time-wasting this campaign.

As per the stats, with the ball in play, the Magpies spend the least time with the ball on the field with an average of 52 percent - translated to 51 minutes and 15 seconds.

Leeds come second on the dreaded list, as their games average just 52.8% of the ball in play.

Aston Villa, manager by former Arsenal man, Unai Emery, come in third in the list of notorious time-wasters with 54.4% of their balls in play on average.

The EPL's least time-wasters

As expected, Manchester City are the side that plays the most football, quite literally.

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The Citizens have the highest percentage of the ball in play among all other teams in the top flight with 61.8%, while Liverpool comes in second with 58%.

EPL culprits who delay play

While Newcastle are notorious for spending the least amount of time with the ball on the field, interesting stats show they may not actually be the biggest time-wasters.

In terms of taking time to start play, Brentford are the worst in the English Premier League, taking an average of 31.4 seconds to restart each play, according to SportBible.

Liverpool are the masters of starting play the fastest, as it only takes 23.2 seconds for the Reds to kick off once the ball is out of play.

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Sports Brief also reported on the best-paid English football players, with Manchester United's Jadon Sancho topping the list.

Raheem Sterling is second on the list after Chelsea convinced him to ditch Man City for West London by making him the top earner.