The Premier League is back!
After a hiatus for the international break, it’s time once again for England’s top 20 sides to battle it out.
With four fixture rounds now completed, trends are starting to emerge and managers are finding out if their pre-season theories are worth sticking with, or twisting.
The international games – as they always do – may well muddy the waters.
Will the same teams (and players) who got off to a flyer come back refreshed and in the same form, or the opposite?
We won’t have long to find out as Liverpool host Newcastle in Saturday’s early kick-off.
Jurgen Klopp’s side have a 100% league record so far, and will be confident of disposing of the Magpies – particularly with Sadio Mane and Mo Salah having been resting themselves at Melwood.
Anyone with one or both of those two in their team could be in for a big points haul this weekend.
Klopp deservedly took the Premier League Manager of the Month. Player of the Month would’ve been altogether less predictable at the start of the season, but it went – almost unsurprisingly given his form – to Teemu Pukki.
His stellar start has not been confined only to the Premier League. He scored in both Finland’s European Championship Qualifiers last week – including against Italy – and with an Aymeric Laporte-less Man City coming up on Saturday evening, he may well continue his goalscoring form.
Man Utd’s Daniel James is another who seems to have the bit between his teeth at the moment.
He scored a very ‘Daniel James’-y goal for Wales against Belarus – and looks likely to keep his place in Ole Solskjaer’s first XI, particularly after being named his side’s player of the month for August.
Burnley should be looking ahead to the remainder of September.
Based on our monthly ‘fixture difficulty assessment’ (see our August in Review article), they have the easiest run of games. When you see that they play Brighton, Norwich and Aston Villa, it’s hard to disagree.
They also had only five players away on international duty (joint fewest in the Premier League alongside Crystal Palace), and should therefore have a fresh squad with which to attack these outings.
If you’re eyeing up their squad, then you could do worse than Dwight McNeil. The young Englishman has impressed many since breaking through last year and with the prolific Ashley Barnes to aim for, could well see chances created turn into assists.
Watford’s start to the season was poor – but the move to replace Javi Gracia seemed premature. And to replace him with former boss Quique Sanches Flores – who left under a cloud – stranger still.
It doesn’t get any easier on the pitch either, with a dangerous Arsenal arriving at Vicarage Road on Sunday afternoon.
Danny Welbeck may be fit to face his old club, but it’s all eyes on the Gunners’ front three. They have looked electric in patches so far, and such is their pace that playing away from home against a side low on confidence could make them even more threatening.
