We were all wrong about Liverpool, Florian Wirtz and Benjamin Sesko as these ten 2025/26 Premier League knee-jerk reactions have already been debunked…
Liverpool will stroll to their 21st Premier League title
Ahead of this season, Liverpool were many people’s favourites to win the Premier League once again, with it becoming the overwhelming consensus that they would do so at a canter once they won their opening five games and Arsenal stuttered in their opening matches.
However, the wheels have fallen off in recent weeks as Liverpool descended into a mini-crisis ahead of the international break, losing three away games in a row against Crystal Palace, Galatasaray and Chelsea.
In truth, the warning signs were there before this sobering run of results, with Liverpool relying on last-minute goals and moments of magic to overshadow subpar team performances during their winning start.
And in their last three games, Liverpool’s luck has run out as they have suffered three deserved defeats, while Arsenal have capitalised to move to the top of the table.
It was initially felt that Liverpool’s statement £400m+ summer spend on signings would make them unstoppable in the Premier League this season. However, it now appears that head coach Arne Slot has made too many changes in a single window and his side’s severe lack of balance at least means they will not steamroll Arsenal and others en route to their 21st crown.
READ: Top ten Premier League defectors features more players from Liverpool than Man Utd
Florian Wirtz will win the PFA Player of the Year award
One such change has seen Slot tweak his midfield and introduce a natural No.10 following the once-British record signing of Wirtz from Bayer Leverkusen for £116m.
Beating Bayern Munich and Manchester City to Wirtz set Liverpool’s stall out for a remarkable summer window, with the special 22-year-old backed heavily as a pre-season favourite to win this season’s PFA Player of the Year award.
But it says a lot about how Wirtz has performed for Liverpool to date that he has suddenly dropped from first to sixth in our ranking of the likeliest winners of this accolade in 2025/26.
007 has become 009 as Wirtz, barring the odd flashes of quality, has been ineffective in all of Liverpool’s Premier League and Champions League matches this season, though he has also been impacted by Slot’s side failing to operate as a unit, with players in all positions suffering.
Wirtz will eventually come to life for Liverpool because he’s too good not to, but he already has very little, if any, chance of picking up the PFA Player of the Year award at the end of his debut season at Anfield.
Mikel Arteta’s handbrake will hold Arsenal back
This season is huge for Arsenal and head coach Mikel Arteta, who have no excuses remaining as they finally look to win big prizes following so many near misses in recent seasons.
After spending around £250m on summer signings, Arteta arguably has the most complete squad in the Premier League with quality options in every position and were Arsenal to come up short, it has been suggested that their head coach’s overreliance on the handbrake would be their undoing.
This argument was brought up as Arsenal left points on the table against Manchester City and Liverpool, though Arteta has implemented changes to put this right in recent weeks.
Arteta went for the proverbial jugular against Newcastle United and his newfound attacking intent reaped rewards as Arsenal earned a 2-1 comeback away victory, which already feels massive. And there was confirmation of a turning point in their next game as he experimented with Eberechi Eze and Martin Odegaard in an exciting midfield three alongside Declan Rice against West Ham.
So, for now at least, Arteta appears to have binned his handbrake as recent victories have given him the blueprint on how to overcome the low block and win while chasing a game, which could be pivotal in this season’s title race.
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Manchester City will be back to their best
Everyone associated with Liverpool and Arsenal would have let out an audible gulp when Man City hammered Wolves 4-0 away on the opening weekend via a brace from Erling Haaland and goals from summer signings Tijjani Reijnders and Rayan Cherki.
However, those same individuals breathed a sigh of relief as Man City followed this big win up with back-to-back losses against Spurs and Brighton, suggesting that Pep Guardiola’s winning machine may not be fully fixed after all.
Man City are certainly in a better position than last season as Phil Foden’s return to form and Gianluigi Donnarumma’s great start have been huge positives, while Haaland has taken his goalscoring and overall game to extraordinary new heights.
Still, this Man City squad is a far cry from the champions of years gone by, with their fragility proven by their opponents’ lack of fear when facing Guardiola’s side who, even with Donnarumma in goal, look shaky at the back and are struggling to put teams away. They will be fine for the top four again, but it’s too soon in their rebuild phase to seriously challenge Liverpool and Arsenal.
Chelsea will be serious Premier League title contenders
Chelsea’s Club World Cup final win over Paris-Saint Germain felt like a coming-out party for Enzo Maresca’s side after they showed great resilience to finish in the top four and win the Europa Conference League to take pressure off of the head coach.
And some argued that their Club World Cup triumph would propel them to being credible Premier League title challengers this season and winners in the next couple of years, but their start to this campaign has indicated that they are in a similar position to 2024/25 and how swiftly an outlook for a manager can change.
The Maresca sack hype picked up last month as Chelsea lost three games in five and their only win was against League One side Lincoln City in the Carabao Cup.
The pressure on Maresca has eased following much-needed wins over Benfica and Liverpool, though Chelsea are lacking a top-quality goalkeeper and centre-back required to take them to the next level.
Newcastle United are “idiots” for Nick Woltemade
“I can only congratulate them in Stuttgart for finding, so to speak, an idiot who would pay that much money, because we certainly wouldn’t have done that.”
Former Bayern Munich chairman Karl-Heinz Rummenigge exemplified the clear bitterness of the Bundesliga champions with this childish dig at Newcastle United over paying £69m to sign Woltemade.
Yes, Newcastle’s desperation to land a suitable replacement for Alexander Isak was exploited by Stuttgart as the Premier League side overpaid to sign Woltemade, who headed to England relatively unproven after only one good season in the German top flight.
But Woltemade sparkled at the summer’s U21 European Championships and has expertly handled the immense pressure of succeeding Isak, with the confidence boost of a debut goal certainly helping his cause.
The 23-year-old has a credible case to be one of the signings of the summer after scoring four goals in his opening seven games, especially considering the pressure he’s under amid the absence of fellow arrival Yoane Wissa. Rummenigge is actually the “idiot”…
Aston Villa will sack Unai Emery
There was a ridiculous early-season clamour for Emery to be sacked by Aston Villa amid their alarming start to this campaign.
In hindsight, everyone should have seen this coming following their failure to secure Champions League qualification, limited transfer activity and speculation surrounding the futures of several key players.
The Premier League’s PSR rules have stuffed Aston Villa more than most, with these factors contributing to Villa finding themselves in the Premier League relegation zone at the start of this season.
The loss of form of Morgan Rogers and Ollie Watkins has made Aston Villa goal-shy, but Emery has found some answers as they have dug deep to climb out of the mire with four consecutive wins in all competitions.
Villa still have their issues with a squad of lesser quality than last season and they will likely struggle to replicate their 2024/25 sixth-place finish, but Emery remains the most important person at Villa and it was daft for anyone to think that they would be better off without him.
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Benjamin Sesko will be the new Rasmus Hojlund
By signing up-and-coming forward Sesko instead of a proven upgrade, e.g. Viktor Gyokeres or Victor Osimhen, to solve their striker problem, Man Utd ran the risk of landing another Hojlund.
In his first season at Old Trafford, Hojlund proved his worth by netting a respectable tally of 16 goals in all competitions, but his second year was a completely different story as he lost all of his confidence and was a shell of his best self.
So it was understandable that United felt he needed to be offloaded and replaced in the summer, with INEOS eventually settling on Sesko, a similar profile of striker, to succeed the Napoli newbie at Old Trafford.
As expected, Sesko immediately came under scrutiny at Man Utd and was quickly written off amid his slow start, but he’s gradually found his feet by scoring in his last two Premier League games. Hojlund, meanwhile, has been a revelation at Napoli, netting four goals in six games, to make a permanent transfer “almost guaranteed”.
The respective performances of these strikers in recent weeks suggest that they have the tools to succeed at Man Utd, though that is heavily dependent on the service provided to them; Sesko is currently dealing with this better than Hojlund did.
Brentford will be doomed under Keith Andrews
It was hard not to worry about Brentford as they lost Thomas Frank, Bryan Mbeumo and Wissa in a single window, while outsiders feared for the worst once they appointed novice boss Andrews to replace their beloved predecessor.
And while these worries were backed up by their 3-1 opening weekend loss to Nottingham Forest, Brentford and Andrews have recovered in their subsequent matches.
Helped by the goalscoring of fit-again Igor Thiago and inspired summer signing Jordan Henderson, Brentford have moved out of the bottom three via Andrews schooling Ruben Amorim and beating Aston Villa.
Brentford still are expected to be in the bottom six this season as they have a weaker squad than recent years, but Andrews is quickly proving himself to be capable of the head coach’s role and it would not be a shock at all if he guides them to survival.
All three promoted sides will fight for Premier League survival
The fight at the bottom is certainly more interesting than it’s been in recent seasons and this is largely thanks to the promoted sides recruiting well and making necessary tactical tweaks to make them more competitive at this level.
Sunderland have been a breath of fresh air under Regis Le Bris and certainly look the most likely of the promoted teams to survive, while Leeds United, despite their lack of bite in attack, have shored up defensively to give themselves a strong platform to secure positive results.
Burnley also acquitted themselves well in their opening couple of matches, but it has been more of the same since the end of August, with Scott Parker’s side only picking up a single point since their sole Premier League win of the campaign against Sunderland.
This already leaves the Clarets in the bottom three and it’s difficult to see a significant improvement en route to another relegation without a scrap due to their newfound defensive frailties and their attack being even worse than it seems as they overperform their xG.