After a two-week hiatus for international football, the Premier League is back this weekend. We’ve looked into seven key issues to keep an eye on in this round of fixtures and beyond.
Can Man Utd Keep Brentford Out for More Than Two Minutes?
Brentford have broken a host of Premier League records in recent weeks by scoring inside two minutes (inside 86 seconds to be precise) in each of their last four games. This weekend they face an out-of-sorts Manchester United side who are without a goal in three Premier League games and also conceded in the third minute of their last home game – against Tottenham.
Thomas Frank’s side have turned kick-offs into a weapon, and a hugely effective one at that, but it isn’t just that they know how to approach launching the ball forward after kicking off. They scored early against Wolves last time out despite not even taking kick-off. Clearly, as well as plenty of thought going into how they take kick-offs and where all their players should be positioned, they are also just very fast starters.
Given United’s woeful early weeks of the season and the mounting pressure on Erik ten Hag, it is entirely possible that they could make a terrible start on Saturday and become the latest team to fall into Brentford’s trap. We can already hear the fan meltdowns at Ten Hag apparently not even bothering to prepare his team for Brentford’s early onslaught.
But if the visitors do score early, it shouldn’t quite be time for everyone (who hasn’t already) to turn on the United manager. Brentford have also – in part by dint of scoring early so often – dropped the joint-most points from winning positions in the Premier League this season (eight).
The only problem from United’s perspective is that they are one of four teams yet to pick up a single point from losing positions this season, along with Liverpool, Southampton and Brentford themselves.
It would probably be an idea for them to make sure they don’t concede early – both for their hopes of getting a result and also to try and avoid the atmosphere turning nasty at Old Trafford.
How Will Liverpool Fare in Their First Big Test Under Slot?
We’ve already laid into United in a section on their game this weekend, so it feels a bit mean to stick the boot in again when moving on to Liverpool’s clash with Chelsea… but we’re going to do it anyway.
Liverpool are top of the table seven games into new manager Arne Slot’s reign, but by using the Opta Power Rankings, we are able to put a value on the quality of each team’s opponents so far – and, as it turns out, Liverpool have had the easiest start to the season.
And yes, that included a trip to Old Trafford.
That has been the biggest test of Slot’s time at the club up to this point on paper, but their 3-0 win was so comfortable that we aren’t sure it counts as the challenge it might have once upon a time.
This Sunday, though, hosting Enzo Maresca’s resurgent Chelsea could well be the biggest test of Liverpool’s title credentials under Slot.
According to our expected points model, which uses expected goals data to work out how matches might have turned based on the quality of their chances, Chelsea’s performances have been even better than their current actual position of fourth suggests. In our expected points table, Chelsea are second.
There are limitations to the model, not least in the fact that a team chasing a goal are more likely to create more chances than a team protecting a lead, and Chelsea have been chasing a winner more than Arsenal or Manchester City – the two teams they overtake in the expected points table. But even if they haven’t actually been better than Arsenal or City, their underlying numbers suggest they are at the very least worthy of a position in the top four.
It’s very early days for Maresca, but his side already appear to be gelling. With three wins from three on the road and a league-high 10 goals scored, they could provide a stern test for Liverpool’s defence. Or more of a test than United did, at least.
Can a Winless Team Win?
Seven games into 2024-25, four teams are still without a win. It’s only the third time in English top-flight history that as many as four teams have remained winless this far into a season after 1964-65 and 2021-22. Surely their luck has to turn before long, right?
There are huge opportunities for three of them, too. Southampton play fellow promoted side Leicester, who only have one win themselves, on Saturday afternoon. However, Russell Martin’s side will need to do better than they did against these opponents last season, when they lost both games by an aggregate score of 9-1. Nevertheless, if there was a time to get your first win of the season, this looks a lot like it.
Ipswich also have a winnable game as they host Everton, who only took one point from their first three away games. Ipswich’s second-most recent Premier League win came in their last meeting with Everton, but it was way back in February 2002. That game was played 18 months before now-39-year-old Everton full-back Ashley Young made his professional debut and four months before Jarrad Branthwaite had even been born. Thinking about it, we’re not sure their last meeting is all that relevant.
Crystal Palace also have a decent opportunity to get a first win of the season on Monday night when they travel to Nottingham Forest. However, Forest have made a strong start to the season, having lost only one game, and Palace haven’t won any of their eight Premier League meetings with the Tricky Trees. They’ll need Eberechi Eze, who has just one goal from 27 shots this season, to find his range if they are to get that much-needed first win.
The final winless side, Wolves, are bottom of the pile and maybe shouldn’t get their hopes up this weekend: they host champions Manchester City at Molineux. Wolves have been a bit of a bogey team for City over the years and did win this fixture last season, but they have also lost seven of their last eight games against City, conceding 25 goals in the process.
It really will be time to start worrying if any of them fail to get a win soon.
Can Fulham Make a Statement in the Race for European Football?
Fulham have been one of the big success stories of the early part of the season, having only seen their five-game unbeaten streak ended at Manchester City last time out in a 3-2 defeat that could very easily have been a draw – or better. The result extended City’s run of home games without defeat to a half-century, and yet in that 50-game run, only six visiting teams have ‘won’ the xG battle.
Fulham won it by a bigger margin (+1.0) than anyone else, having created chances worth 2.6 xG to City’s 1.57 xG.
Few teams dominate City, particularly away from home, and so while Fulham came away from the game with nothing to show for it in the league table, they will rightly take a huge amount of confidence from the fact they created so much against superior opponents.
This weekend, back on home soil, they might well fancy their chances of securing a statement result against Aston Villa.
Villa are competing in the Champions League and will certainly have grander hopes this season than Fulham – namely in trying to secure a regular spot among the Premier League’s elite. But even manager Unai Emery would admit his team haven’t been quite at their free-flowing best, relying rather too heavily on supersub Jhon Durán’s heroics late on to win games, and then stumbling to draws in their last two matches before the international break.
Marco Silva’s side could quite feasibly get a win that would see them leapfrog Villa in the table. Getting back into Europe shouldn’t be considered beyond this exciting Fulham side.
How Convincing Can Arsenal Be?
Arsenal come into this weekend’s trip to Bournemouth in a good place, on a run of four successive wins, third in the table, just one point behind leaders Liverpool, and unbeaten in all competitions. On the face of things, there isn’t really anything to complain about from their season so far.
However, their recent run hasn’t been that convincing. They battered Leicester in their 4-2 win, racking up their joint-highest shot total in a Premier League game (36) and their second-highest expected goals total (4.62 xG), but they still required a 94th-minute winner. Meanwhile, against another promoted side in Southampton last time out, they went a goal down before battling back to win.
Back on the road against Bournemouth this weekend, Arsenal now begin a trickier run that also takes in games against Liverpool, Newcastle, Chelsea and Inter before the next international break. Still awaiting news of the extent of the injury Bukayo Saka sustained on England duty and with Martin Ødegaard unlikely to return this month, it could be a testing period.
Some might argue they don’t need to be any more convincing. Staying within touching distance of the top of the table is all that matters at this stage of the season, particularly while without such an important player in Ødegaard.
But some might reasonably think Arsenal could do with a couple of comfortable, regulation wins that don’t need quite so much effort from the players or that stress the fans out as much. Saturday’s game at Bournemouth would be a good place to start ahead of the visit of Liverpool a week later.
Which Spurs Will Turn Up?
Tottenham produced one of the most astonishing capitulations the Premier League has ever seen when they threw away a two-goal half-time lead to lose to Brighton last time out. They were precisely as terrible in the second half as they were good before the break.
Optimists might focus on that first-half performance and say it is proof of just how effective Ange Postecoglou’s football can be. But Spurs could not put the game to bed, unable to make their dominance of possession, territory and the game’s best chances count. And they were made to pay in ruthless fashion. Postecoglou’s critics will say they once again gave up far too many chances far too easily.
A home London derby against West Ham in Saturday’s early kick-off appears to be both the perfect game in which to bounce back with a win while also being the type of game this Spurs side could slip up in.
Indeed, in this very fixture last term, they threw away a 1-0 half-time lead and a position of near total dominance to lose 2-1. Spurs have lost four of their last six Premier League London derbies, and there aren’t many teams who would be more motivated to continue that poor record than West Ham. Michail Antonio, who has scored more Premier League goals against Tottenham (six) than he has against any other opponent, will be licking his lips at the prospect of further hurting their cross-town rivals.
So, which Spurs will show up on Saturday afternoon? It’s genuinely impossible to say.
Are Any Injury Crises on the Horizon?
During the international break, we looked at how busy the football calendar is these days, and asked whether football was at breaking point. There are more than a few players who believe the demand on them is now too great.
We’ve just had a couple of weeks off from club football but many of the best players in the world will have played two international games in that time and travelled long distances, and the domestic schedule is about to get really, really busy.
The teams who are competing in Europe – none of whom have been knocked out of the EFL Cup – each face seven games in the space of three weeks before the next international break. After that brief interlude, before long it’s into the notoriously packed festive schedule.
With the fixtures piling up, the players’ durability will be tested to its limits, and managers will be challenged to rotate and rest players wherever possible and whenever justifiable.
According to premierinjuries.com, 10 of the Premier League’s 20 teams have at least six players carrying injuries heading into the weekend. Three – Arsenal, Brighton and Manchester United – have as many as nine injury concerns.
The upcoming period could make or break the season, and keeping players fit and available will be crucial.
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