Premier League 26/27 could be a stone-cold classic (if we ignore Man City)

You can’t win the league in September, but you can certainly define it. The overarching narrative of this season’s Premier League has already been written with Manchester City’s 114 charges being the Avengers Doomsday to the rest of the Premier League’s indie film when it comes to dominating headlines.

But away from the corruption, cheating and overall existential question of what have we all done with our lives for the past 17 years, the other 19 Premier League teams have all quietly contributed to what is shaping up to be an intriguing campaign of football.

Here’s some of the reasons why we could be in for a good one.

The Big Six’s stuttering start
Other than City, who do not really feel like an actual team at the moment, every one of the Big Six has lost already this campaign.

And pleasingly, not all of these results have been against each other. Arsenal got spanked 3-0 by Brighton. Chelsea have lost to Brentford. United began the year with a defeat to Hull. Spurs are Spurs.

You could look at each of that six and pick out a problem. Arsenal are still rather blunt up top and have scored the fewest goals of anyone in the top six barring Everton. And Everton don’t count.

Chelsea score for fun but also let in goals at a similar rate. Liverpool have a lot of expensive players that can’t seem to do anything and a very long list of injuries. Manchester United have a rubbish manager. Spurs are three years deep into an existential crisis. City have 114 problems.

The Premier League’s USP has long been its competitiveness and that looks to be particularly true this year.

Chelsea being bonkers
For any neutral, there is one team you want to watch this season more than any other – Chelsea.

It’s like watching a game on FIFA. Only two teams score more goals per match than Chelsea but the club is joint bottom for conceding them too. The game against Bournemouth was that in microcosm. Chelsea scored five goals but actually had a lower xG than Bournemouth.

The reason why Chelsea can get away with this, for now, is their highly efficient front three.

Morgan Rogers has an xG of 2.7 in the last five but has four goals. Joao Pedro’s is 2.1 in that period and he has five. Only Cole Palmer is underperforming on his xG but he has three assists to complement that. Two of the four top scorers this season are Chelsea players and there is an enjoyable chaos to their games.

But it comes at a cost.

Chelsea have conceded a combined xG of 10.2 this season, putting them 14th in the list and well behind league leaders Arsenal. Emi Martinez produces an average of 4.2 saves per game, the highest of any keeper in the league.

Xabi Alonso’s Bayer Leverkusen invincible team was based on defensive discipline, and yet Chelsea have not found any semblance of that so far this season.

Alonso should be able to coach this out of his team but expect more chaotic matches in the meantime.

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All three promoted teams are decent
Coventry’s 4-1 smashing of Newcastle meant that all three promoted teams currently find themselves out of the relegation zone with two of them in the top half.

Considering the pre-season predictions of a swift return to the second tier for the trio, the three of them have so far defied expectations.

In Hull’s case, it has been built upon defensive solidity. The Tigers started the year with three clean sheets in a row and even if they have since gone three without one, they have managed to keep the scorelines relatively low. Six goals conceded, including just two against the free-scoring Chelsea, is the second lowest in the Premier League.

Ipswich have been less defensively solid but far more so than they were in their Premier League season of two years ago. Gary O’Neil’s squad was invested in heavily in the summer and the result is a lot of Premier League experience. It’s how losing to Fulham in the 87th minute becomes a 2-1 win.

Even Coventry, who looked the worst of the three in the early stages, have put together back-to-back wins.

The result is no longer a feeling of a non-existent relegation battle. The predicted City points deduction should keep one up at least but there is a real possibility that, for the first time since the 2022/23 season, all three survive.

Which means there could be some parts of the Premier League furniture relegated…

A whole load of clubs facing a relegation battle
Looking at the table, where does the relegation battle realistically end? Up to Ipswich in 10th? Even as high as Hull in eighth?

It’s very early to be giving the table too much credit but there are an awful lot of teams who look at risk of being sucked into a relegation battle.

Fulham are obviously in trouble with two points in six games and even if their manager may have managed the biggest club in the world, he had a win percentage of 64% there when he had Kylian Mbappe at his disposal.

The Cottagers are one of three winless teams which surprisingly/unsurprisingly, depending on how you expected it, also includes Spurs.

The scoreline did not reflect it but Spurs actually looked quite good against an admittedly rubbish Manchester United at the weekend. They created almost double the xG and should really have won the game before the red card.

Taken in isolation, you could say that being 19th is just a quirk of being so early in the season but you do not get that luxury when you have finished 17th for the past two seasons.

Bournemouth have also quietly had a poor start with just three points from their opening six. They are one of three teams juggling Europe that find themselves near the bottom of the table.

Sunderland and Aston Villa have also struggled to get going while Oliver Glasner’s big-money move to Nottingham Forest has resulted in just five points so far.

It is then shaping up to be quite a fun relegation battle. Unless you support any of the clubs in it.

The Bermuda Triangle (and Everton) being good
Pre-season, the BBC took it upon themselves to name Bournemouth, Brighton and Brentford as the Bermuda Triangle of the Premier League and while the Cherries have got lost, the other two look very strong.

Brighton in particular have a legitimate chance at Champions League football next season while Brentford pulled off an impressive scalp in Chelsea.

Adding to that trio are Everton, who might actually do something for the first time in seemingly forever.

It is about time Toffees fans had something to enjoy too, for they are the only club in the Football League that has not won a trophy or been relegated since 1995. Proper Everton that.

That probably won’t change this year but at least Everton fans can enjoy watching their team play and not treat it as some kind of masochism exercise.

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