Premier League Winners and Losers: Arsenal Shine, Liverpool Slip, and Spurs Face Tough Questions
Although their ascension to the top of the table forces them to take on the unwelcome role of Premier League title favourites with all the pitfalls and booby traps that come with it, it is not surprising to see who leads the winners section this week.
Due to Crystal Palace’s season-opening loss, the 2025–26 club isn’t the only Arsenal team to have enjoyed a successful weekend; mini-crisis-ridden Liverpool and the most troubled man in the world, Ange Postecoglou, are among the losers.
The inevitable Erling Haaland, Tottenham, Bournemouth, Antoine Semenyo, and grinning philosopher-poet Jack Grealish are some of the more upbeat types.
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Teams that won their premier league fixtures
Arsenal
When we named the Gunners the Premier League favourites last week, some of them weren’t very happy. They are now powerless to change that. We can certainly relate to the fear.
If you place second again, being referred to be a favourite will just lead to tedious charges of bottle jobs. Even calling second place a first loser is unacceptable in the age of the nuance-free cultural war; second place is a first bottler.
It makes sense to be reluctant to embrace the favorite’s mantle when it has previously happened three times in a row and your last championship was more than 20 years ago.
However, it cannot be avoided. The best team in the nation is Arsenal, while their second team is perhaps the fourth or fifth best in the nation.
With the limited margin for error that Premier League title challenges now allow, it was a legitimate concern that they would suffer terminal damage from a horribly difficult opening set of fixture.
They have now taken the lead as we enter the second half and appear to be in a prime position to truly stretch their legs and create a gap.
Arsenal will play Fulham, Crystal Palace, Burnley, and Sunderland in the Premier League before the November international break. Liverpool’s opponents are Man City, Brentford, Aston Villa, and Manchester United. Everton, Aston Villa, Bournemouth, and Liverpool are the opponents of Man City.
Despite combining those strange home losses to nil with 6-0 and 5-2 victories at the London Stadium, Mikel Arteta and his team have managed to escape the distinctly Arsenal-like trap they have fallen into at home against West Ham in each of the previous two seasons. Now, opportunity is knocking unignorably loudly right here, right now.
Their ability to avoid defeats is already unmatched for another season, and it’s only the first weekend of October.
Newcastle
Newcastle’s season hasn’t started off well after a challenging summer marred by The Isak Unpleasantness, but there are now many reasons to be optimistic about what lies ahead.
Arsenal, Liverpool, and Barcelona have been their only opponents, and two of those losses were tragically late.
Bradford in the Carabao is the only team this season to even score against Newcastle aside from that elite trio, and it was after a team that had already had four in-game changes and was ahead 3-0.
Even though they were playing against a Forest team and manager who are currently giving a six-week definition of the phrase “beleaguered,” Newcastle’s defence and midfield were flawless on Sunday, and their intense pressing drove Forest into goal-conceding mistakes.
The overall picture is likely better than six goals and just nine points from seven league games, sitting below even Manchester United in the table, would imply.
However, there is still some huff and puff surrounding Newcastle’s attacking style as they adjust to the post-Isak reality.
Nick Pope
After he completely ruined a 95-minute masterclass against Arsenal with two major mistakes in the build-up to the Gunners’ late, late winner, his fifth clean sheet in seven Premier League games this season more than anyone else, of course was undoubtedly one of the easiest of his career but still welcome.
Nick Woltemade
The harshest of penalties to solidify the German’s already apparent status as a Tyneside cult favourite. And perhaps it will bring more bitter, bitter tears from Bayern Munich, who must watch Harry Kane instead because of their transgressions, as he has only brought them 18 goals this season.
Tottenham’s form in away game
The outcome of Tottenham’s first Premier League season under Thomas Frank is still up in the air.
Although their four victories and 14 points suggest that they are somewhat defying gravity, there is unquestionably a newfound steel about this very work-in-progress team.
In the many games where they will unavoidably dominate the ball and the onus is on them to take the initiative, Spurs have managed to accumulate a respectable number of points despite clearly still not fully figuring out how to combine defensive steel and long-ball football with attacking thrust and craft.
The fact that they have been far more productive away from home is one of the season’s early peculiarities. After visiting Manchester City, West Ham, Brighton, and Leeds, they have now collected ten points, which is obviously a result any team would be happy with.
At the moment, it has by far the best away record in the league, with Newcastle, the only other team undefeated away from home, likewise winless and, in fact, goalless.
Though Spurs have only secured four points from their home games against Wolves, Burnley, and Bournemouth.
It is a genuinely absurd situation that both of the egregiously poor league performances against Bournemouth and Wolves occurred in front of their own supporters: Spurs have already won as many Premier League games on the road this season as they have at home in their previous 17 games.
Mohammed Kudus
Another oddity with Spurs is that, while we wouldn’t list any of their summer acquisitions in our current top ten Premier League summer signings, we also believe that few fared better in the end at fixing glaring flaws.
There are hopeful indications that Joao Palhinha and Frank are making progress in figuring out how to get him engaged higher up the pitch.
Joao Palhinha is the exact midfield midfielder Spurs have been lacking since Mousa Dembele retired.
When given a fair opportunity in a No. 10 position with freedom to roam wide, Xavi Simons showed additional signs of catching up, while Mathys Tel scored a goal that might spark an interest in a player who hasn’t yet shown Spurs supporters even a small portion of his potential.
However, Mohammed Kudus who is more like the player we saw in his first year at West Ham than the second, is undoubtedly the Spurs summer addition who comes closest to receiving significant individual recognition.
Similar to Tel, his season-opening goal was partially due to luck due to a deflection, but like Tel, he made it possible for luck to come his way in a way that maybe no other player on the pitch could have.
When thinking about Spurs’ somewhat frustrating lack of originality during these early years under Frank, it’s important to keep in mind that they are still without James Maddison and Dejan Kulusevski, whose presence would much help to resolve the problems.
If you notice, what Kudus has to offer is revolutionary. His four Premier League assists this season are the most of any player, and there are already many reasons to believe that he and Pedro Porro’s connection on the right is only beginning.
Aston Villa
A compelling illustration of how the Europa League group stage, which is frequently viewed as a nuisance and a hardship, can actually help bring a season to life.
After losing all five of their Premier League games and losing to Brentford on penalties, Unai Emery has now won four straight games to lift the spirits at Villa Park.
In addition to a completely rejuvenating pair of home league victories over Fulham and Burnley, the first and third of those victories occurred in the Europa League, most notably on the road against Feyenoord last week.
The fundamental problems behind the scenes still exist, and league games against Tottenham, Manchester City, and Liverpool may require even more work from the Europa to keep spirits high, but everything appears much happier than it did just two weeks ago.
Donyell Malen
After waiting 176 days and 15 games to score his fourth goal for Aston Villa, he scored his fifth goal in less than an hour, including halftime against Burnley.
Ruben Amorim
A Win! A spotless record? A break abroad when he most certainly won’t get fired! He probably wouldn’t have been fired anyhow, but he will undoubtedly appreciate the silence and the opportunity however fleeting to let other teams and managers take a break from the intense spotlight of the problem.
Senne Lammens
Although it wasn’t all the Belgian goalie’s fault that Manchester United’s first clean sheet of the season fell on his debut, he did exude a calm professionalism that the team has sorely lacked for so long.
This served as a reminder that a composed and comforting goalie can significantly reduce the jitters of an entire team.
Pep Guardiola
We’re still not convinced that this version of Man City can contend with either Liverpool or Arsenal for the championship, but we’re not as sure of our concerns as we were following back-to-back losses to Brighton and Tottenham.
Guardiola’s 1-0 victory at Brentford on Sunday, which started out comfortably but ended up being nerve-wracking, was his 250th league victory in just 349 Premier League games. With a top-tier English club, no other manager has ever reached the milestone more quickly.
Erling Haaland
Running onto Josko Gvardiol’s clipped long ball and hammering Brentford’s center-backs out of the way was another goal straight out of his Dortmund playbook.
When he plays like this, he appears to be an unbeatable playground bully, and it’s obvious that he’s enjoying City’s newfound willingness to play a little more directly more frequently.
With a first goal at the Gtech, he also closed one of the few blank spaces on his Premier League resume, making Anfield the only Premier League stadium where he has not scored.
He now has 94 Premier League goals, which is the same as Dimitar Berbatov’s career total. The players he is currently grabbing are becoming even more legendary in this league. Ruud van Nistelrooy is only one step behind him, while Didier Drogba is three. These are ridiculous figures.
Bournemouth
We can’t wait to see which of the two officially assumes the “Could they really do a Leicester?” mantle when they play Crystal Palace in the first game back after the international break.
Semenyo currently has 12 goals (eight goals, four assists) that are directly related to him, more than any other player, if we go back to the beginning of May rather than the beginning of this season.
We are always supporters of cheating to get statistics to indicate what we want them to.
Despite strong interest in Semenyo, Bournemouth had no choice but to cash in on their valuable defensive assets, but their decision to remain tight now appears to be their most important call of the summer.
Jack Grealish
Grealish, who scored a thrilling late goal for Everton against Palace, who had never lost, and then gave a happy post-match analysis that can only be fully appreciated when the philosopher-poet’s thoughts are presented, as they undoubtedly were, in verse, are the rarest examples of a man who has been more obviously enjoying football again:
I enjoy activities in my life, And when I feel like it, It’s something I enjoy doing. One of them is football. I adore playing football. While I’m having fun the way I am, Nothing is superior.
Chelsea Forward
When you look at Chelsea’s team, it’s easy to infer that there are just too many half-decent, difficult wide players for it to work effectively.
After a late but well-earned victory over the struggling champions, a number of those half-decent, difficult wide players show to be the difference-makers, and you start to question whether Chelsea is indeed the sane team in a cr*zy world.
Enzo Maresca
The victory was a major message for Maresca and his team. The vultures were circling following a careless loss to Brighton and a foolish loss to Manchester United.
However, Maresca got every aspect of his substitutions and timing perfect, as Chelsea outplayed and outlasted the Premier League winners on Saturday night.
That’s about as big of a win as he could have hoped for this weekend, and he’s bought himself a lot of time to figure out how to get this kind of productivity from this pricey but occasionally perplexing collection of top football players.
Teams that loose their premier league fixtures
Ange Postecoglou
When Nottingham Forest lost to Newcastle, they weren’t even that poor. They maintained their defensive stance deep into the second half, and when they did give up, it was due to a long-range goal from Bruno Guimaraes rather than a structural failure.
On the face of it, it would seem insane to judge a manager a month into their position based on a passable showing in a loss at a place like Newcastle.
Postecoglou’s issue, however, is that he has so completely destroyed any chance of goodwill in far simpler games when his shortcomings have been more brutally revealed.
If he had avoided losing to Swansea, Sunderland, or Midtjylland, no one would be accusing him of a sacking crime.
The City Ground’s home crowd’s reaction on Thursday night was sufficient to inform you that the manager is already on borrowed time and that any further losses will not be given any leeway.
There aren’t many similar instances of supporters becoming so enraged with a manager just after they were appointed.
They don’t think this will improve, and to their credit, they have a lot of hard-to-dispute data from Postecoglou’s prior Premier League job.
This incapacity to find equilibrium still exists. an incapacity to play effective defensive football without completely giving up the attack or compelling offensive football without fatally exposing the defence.
There is the seemingly intractable and basic weakness of set-pieces. It merely highlights the foolishness of the type of managerial change Forest made at the time, not that Postecoglou was incorrect to position his squad to play more defensively against Newcastle.
Nottingham Forest
Now that they are facing the frighteningly real possibility of a relegation struggle of the kind they believed they had left behind, they must seriously consider firing a second manager this season before the leaves have completely fallen from the difficult trees.
Presently serving as a warning to those outside the gilded elite that, despite your sense of security and how far your feet appear to have sunk under the table, you are always only one or two mistakes away from possible disaster.
Wolve
After a dismal five-game losing streak to begin the season, it is good to have some points on the board.
Wolves’ recovery has been much more slowed down than it could have been due to late equalisers they gave up to Brighton and Tottenham, bringing their wait for a Premier League victory to 11 games since the team’s last exciting run of six straight victories in March and April.
Liverpool
Overreacting to Liverpool losing a few late-night victories is no more logical than overreacting to Liverpool winning a few late-night victories.
It is still much too early to declare a crisis for a squad that is only one point behind the Premier League leaders and is still trying to lock down a number of new players.
It’s also undeniable that something feels terribly off in this place. More masking was caused by the late victories Liverpool scored than by the ones they gave up.
Chelsea and Crystal Palace both performed admirably against Liverpool and were deserving winners.
They didn’t, however, do anything particularly unusual from the other teams that were denied something after coming extremely near.
These late goals that Liverpool has given up haven’t destroyed or taken them. They have seemed like the logical conclusion to dull, uninspired performances.
They also have to come up with answers quickly. Although it is not yet a crisis, it feels very much like the beginning of one.
Their post-interleague schedule is ineffective; league matches against Manchester United, Aston Villa, and Man City, Champions League matches against Eintracht Frankfurt and Real Madrid, and a Carabao matchup with their recently formed rival Crystal Palace all clearly present opportunities for rifts to deepen and worries to grow.
Slot is probably not surprised by any of it because he is a clever and astute man, but he has been made acutely aware of how precarious a Premier League manager’s life is.
He won a championship in his rookie season, and now, two weeks after leading his team to their fifth consecutive win to begin the season, he finds himself under intense scrutiny for his strategies, acquisitions, team choices, and baldness as he sits next to Scott Parker in the Sack Race betting.
The Newly Promoted Teams
This was a humiliating weekend, we remain hopeful that this year’s crop of promoted clubs is more prepared than those of prior years to give us at least a legitimate relegation fight.
Although none of the losses to Spurs, Man United, and Villa were particularly devastating, the fact that Leeds, Sunderland, and Burnley all lost on the same matchday for the first time this season served as a reminder of just how difficult it will still be for them to upset the Settled Seventeen.
Fulham
There’s no reason to panic just yet. With consecutive 3-1 losses to Aston Villa and Bournemouth, Fulham has just inadvertently put itself in a precarious situation.
It’s a tangle that might get much more complicated because Arsenal and Newcastle are coming right after the international break.
Westham
Where exactly are they going to get the points to escape this relegation battle if they can’t even count on the three banker points from a trip to the Emirates? Indeed, it’s a difficult question with no simple solution.
Vitor Pereira
dismissed for “irresponsible behaviour in the technical area” just prior to Wolves’ opening match against Brighton, which is a pretty amazing set of words.
Was he in the technical section, running with scissors? Placing hot beverages on top of the technical area’s monitors? In the technical field, are you dangerously lifting large objects?
Martin Odegaard
Odegaard hasn’t played more than 38 minutes in a Premier League game since starting and finishing at Old Trafford on the first weekend.
He is the first player in history to be substituted in the first half of three consecutive starts.
A terrible run of injury luck at a time when a player faces more competition than ever for a spot in Arsenal’s starting lineup is especially detrimental.
Manchester United
At the moment, we are unsure if winning games is in Manchester United Football Club’s best interests in the long run.
Until Ruben Amorim can demonstrate that he can do it twice in a succession, anyway. Next up is Liverpool. Don’t worry, Ruben.
