On each
1) The principle you have is correct. I can't argue against that. However I would add in 2 counters. Firstly that a fair amount of damage has "been done" to many of those top teams. In some it shows up in injuries already, with others it's players already pushed to the red zone. In most cases I sense you have both. So we don't all enter this period equally. Most of the bottom 14 have more rested players. If you look at us, Davies, Gordon, Nknonkou, Bernard, Iwobi, Sigurdsson are fresh, have not been injured at all and have been getting miles into the legs training each week.
Secondly it's worth saying that all teams are playing 2 per week, and the aforemtioned teams have not been coping with it well either. I saw City/Liverpool have had 15/16 injuries. So it's not like they are fantastic at getting beyond it. What's likely is all teams now start getting injuries. However look at City and Liverpool's benchs, they are left with 3 outfield senior players. Another net 6 injuries (which is a plausible number) and they are into kids. To me that has a bigger drop off in performance.
Essentially weare not all entering what will be a hellacious phase equally and given the chaos that this is going to bring, I suspect inconsistency wil be the consequence (as it has been thus far). I don't see 4 teams going on runs winning 10 from 12. The best chance they had of that was early in the season, pre Europe, after the initial rest. They didn't do it then.
2) Yes I agree. It will have a much more telling effect moving forward. However, these top teams tend to heavily refrsh their squads, either every season, or 2-3. While some did good business, outside of Chelsea I don't thinkany had the sort of recruitment you'd have normally expected, and needed to maintain position.
I mean there's an obvious cavaet, that Liverpool can probably drop off 20% and still win the league (which appears the most likely outcome, they get to say 78 points and win it).
There's medium term opportunities here though. United and Arsenal are teetering and while Spurs are in a good moment, when loans have to sgtart being repaid, there will be pressure.