Will Newcastle set a template for facing Rodri-less City?
Rodri’s ACL injury has sent shockwaves through the title race - and it falls on Newcastle United to show that the Pep Guardiola machine can be defeated.
Since 2019/20, Manchester City have averaged only 1.9 points per Premier League match without Rodri, losing one in every three. Continue like that and they will end the 2024/25 campaign with just 76 points.
Rodri is the anchor of the team on and off the ball; the man who gives City’s possession urgency and the man who shuts down opposition counter-attacks before they’ve even started.
And as (bad) luck would have it, Newcastle are the perfect fast-transition team to expose a Rodri-less Man City and provide the template for everyone else to follow.
Eddie Howe’s side played in exactly this manner in a 2-1 win over Tottenham Hotspur, the only top-half side from 2023/24 that Newcastle have played so far this season.
Alexander Isak's winner that day was the kind of direct, line-breaking counter we can expect this explosive Newcastle team to attempt repeatedly against Man City.
It all comes down to self-belief. If Newcastle press and attack as boldly as Brentford did in their opening 20 minutes against City a fortnight ago, when Thomas Frank’s side could have gone at least 3-0 up, then Howe can reveal a soft underbelly in Rodri’s absence.
Will Ten Hag or Postecoglou be under more pressure at full-time?
When the final whistle blows on Sunday evening, Erik ten Hag or Ange Postecoglou - both on seven points from five matches - could be feeling the heat. Crisis talk feels close for both managers.
Manchester United sit 11th in the table but their mixed results paint a confusing picture. Three clean sheets from five matches is good, as is their Expected Goals (xG) of 9.6, the third-highest in the division and yet Ten Hag’s side haven’t really caught the eye.
Should they lose or draw against Spurs, Man Utd will have fewer points (seven or eight) than at the same stage of their disastrous 2023/24 campaign (nine). It will no doubt prompt another anxious week of soul-searching.
Meanwhile a 3-1 win against Brentford last weekend was by far Spurs' best performance of the campaign, and the kind of high-energy blitz we got used to seeing in the first half of last season.
Spurs produced an xG of 3.52, the highest in any Premier League match in 2024/25, suggesting Sunday’s headline fixture will be a stern test of whether Man Utd’s defending has really improved.
But Postecoglou can scarcely afford a step backwards. Defeat at Old Trafford would drag Spurs into the bottom half of the table - and crank up the pressure on the head coach.
Has Maresca been good or lucky?
Unbeaten Brighton & Hove Albion are the kind of team we need to test Chelsea, because five matches into Enzo Maresca’s tenure, we really have no idea where his team are at.
Ten points from five matches and just a single defeat, away to Man City, is without question a good start. But, by accident or design, Chelsea don’t look like a Maresca team.
Are they just reacting to events, have they got lucky, or has Maresca taken a left turn? We might be able to start answering those questions on Saturday.
Here’s the issue: Maresca’s Leicester were often criticised, even by their own fans, for being slow and boring to watch, whereas so far Chelsea have played some wonderfully direct, transitional football.
They top the Premier League charts for fast breaks, with 13, which is entirely at odds with Maresca's usual methods. Leicester averaged 0.76 per 90 minutes in 2023/24. Chelsea are currently averaging 2.6 per 90.
Chelsea have also over-performed their xG by more than any other side this season, 11 goals from 8.0 xG, suggesting that there is some luck involved here.
Brighton won’t leave as much space for sudden darting runs and won’t be so easily tackled in their own third.
Consequently, we should learn whether Maresca’s Chelsea are purposefully crafted or an accident; whether they are good or just lucky.
Will Arsenal need set-pieces again in Odegaard's absence?
Rodri’s injury has stolen focus, but we shouldn’t lose sight of the impact Martin Odegaard’s injury is having on Arsenal.
Discounting an EFL Cup tie against Bolton Wanderers in which Mikel Arteta rung the changes, Arsenal have played three matches in all competitions since losing Odegaard. They have scored three goals, including two from set-pieces and have averaged an xG of only 0.7 per match.
Man City and Spurs were strong opponents, of course and we should acknowledge the impact of Arteta’s decision to sit deep in both of these matches.
But the 0-0 draw with Atalanta in the Uefa Champions League, in which the Gunners held 46% possession and had a meagre six shots, is harder to explain.
Luckily for Arsenal, Odegaard may only miss two more Premier League matches, the home encounters with Leicester City and Southampton.
You would expect them to navigate the first one just fine. Arsenal’s recent reliance on set-pieces isn’t a problem against Leicester, who have conceded 2.2 xG from dead balls this season, the second-most in the Premier League.
Can Nuno get Forest winning at the City Ground?
It’s a strange quirk that Nottingham Forest have made a brilliant and undefeated start to the 2024/25 season but are yet to win at the City Ground.
In fact, each of their last four league wins have all come in away games and Forest are winless in five at home.
This is good news for Forest fans because it shows they have not yet hit their ceiling. There is clear room in which to grow, despite already having the third-lowest Expected Goals Against (xGA) figure in the Premier League (4.05), behind only Man City and Liverpool.
Those improvements can begin on Saturday when Nuno Espirito Santo's men welcome Fulham, who are coincidentally the last team they beat on home soil.
Fulham, yet to win on their travels in 2024/25, were beaten 3-1 back in April in a classic counter-attacking performance from Forest. Indeed it proved so ferocious that Marco Silva, with his side 2-0 down, made a triple substitution after only 33 minutes.
But in a boost for Silva's side, the star of that match, Morgan Gibbs-White, is suspended for this one. Chris Wood, scorer of 14 goals in 21 Premier League matches under Espirito Santo, will need to step up again.
Will Eze or McNeil help their respective teams get a first win?
There are still six Premier League clubs yet to win a match this season and two of them go head-to-head at Goodison Park.
Self-evidently this is a huge contest at the bottom and a chance for Everton and Crystal Palace to put things right.
The hosts have led in three matches and dropped eight points from winning positions, while Palace have drawn their last three in a row, which is to say both teams look capable of moving swiftly up the table.
Another similarity is that both are reliant on one key attacker.
Eberechi Eze has had 20 shots and created 10 chances, having a hand in 50% of Palace’s attempts this season, a higher proportion than any other Premier League player.
He was impressive in the second half against Man Utd last weekend but a glaring late miss lingers in the memory. He will want to make amends.
As for Everton, Dwight McNeil has been at the heart of everything, creating more chances (20) and more big chances (six) than any other player in the Premier League.
On Saturday one of these two players might create, or score, the most important goal of their respective team’s season so far.
Can Villa raise their game against stubborn Ipswich?
Aston Villa supporters should be excited, not because they are in the top four again but rather because they are there while still playing within themselves.
Unai Emery was unhappy with his side’s tepid first-half performance against Wolverhampton Wanderers last weekend before a second-half turnaround. This followed a comeback victory after being 2-0 down against Everton, getting away with a poor performance to win 2-1 at Leicester, and beating West Ham United 2-1 on the opening day, thanks to a late glaring miss from Tomas Soucek.
Ironically, Villa’s best performance of the season so far was in the only match they lost, a 2-0 home defeat to Arsenal.
They will need to raise their game to keep their winning streak going at Ipswich Town, who have looked resilient and punchy in three consecutive Premier League draws.
Perhaps the return of the injured Leon Bailey, who provided much-needed urgency off the bench against Wolves, can raise Villa’s game.
Whatever the missing ingredient, you would back Emery to find the solution on Sunday. He has won nine out of 10 Premier League matches as Villa head coach against newly promoted sides, including victory in all four away matches.
Can West Ham finally show us what a Lopetegui team looks like?
Julen Lopetegui was supposed to bring calm possession football that would limit opposition chances, but so far West Ham look stuck between the old methods and the new.
In his final year in Spain, Sevilla averaged 59.4% possession and conceded only 30 goals, the fewest in the division. It was Lopetegui at his best: hogging the ball and moving it slowly in order to minimise risk.
So far it has not taken hold at West Ham, who have allowed 16 direct attacks against them, more than any other Premier League side this season. They have also held the minority of possession in three matches, including the clashes with Fulham (46%) and Crystal Palace (42%).
West Ham don’t look organised or coherent yet - and Brentford, a bullish side who capitalise on fast transitions - might make things worse.
Then again, Frank will likely allow Lopetegui’s team to dominate the ball. That might provide West Ham with the foundation to finally start enacting some of the new head coach's principles.
Is there any hope Wolves can repeat Forest’s trick against Liverpool?
It doesn’t look good for Wolves this weekend. The contrasts with Liverpool are many.
Winless from their first five matches, Wolves have conceded a competition-high 14 goals in the Premier League this season and now face the team who have conceded the fewest, with one.
Wolves have now gone 17 matches without a clean sheet, while under Arne Slot, Liverpool have won every game in which they have scored.
If there is any hope for Gary O’Neil’s side, it is dispensing with the high press we saw in their 6-2 defeat to Chelsea and copying the way Forest beat Liverpool earlier this month.
Wolves have had success in the past with a more conservative approach, relying on counter-attacking bursts from Matheus Cunha and Hwang Hee-chan.
It’s obvious this is the right way to play against Liverpool but O’Neil may be too committed to his playing style to show that kind of humility.
Can Iraola get the home win he so desperately needs?
Beating Everton despite being 2-0 down after 87 minutes was supposed to kickstart AFC Bournemouth’s season. Instead, they haven’t scored a single goal in their three matches since.
What happened late on at Goodison Park is beginning to look like an anomaly, although there were green shoots of recovery at Anfield last weekend despite the 3-0 scoreline.
Bournemouth had 19 shots, the joint most by an away team at Liverpool since Opta records began in 2003/04.
If they can play with that kind of attacking energy against a wide-open Southampton, then surely Andoni Iraola will get the home win he so badly needs.
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