On Friday the Premier League makes its return. Manchester United host Fulham at Old Trafford. As everyone looks to catch Manchester City in the league, there have been fewer big signings due to the impact of Profit and Sustainability Rules (PSR) which restricts spending, under threat of point deductions, to ensure that teams are balancing outgoing sales with incoming transfers.
In years past, the Premier League would be flush with stars joining, but these rules make it tougher for a team like Chelsea to buy a star like Napoli striker Victor Osimhen without sending a large portion of their current squad out the door first. Because of these rules, there hasn’t been the kind of offseason upheaval in the Premier League that fans might be used to, so making bold predictions is a little tougher than normal.
Fortune may favor the bold, but sweeping predictions sometimes need significant change and there hasn’t been much of that this summer. For some teams, that’s a good thing as consistency improves what a side like Newcastle United can do in the upcoming season but for others, stagnation could prove to be fatal.
With that, let’s take a look at some predictions for the new season:
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Alexander Isak to challenge for the Golden Boot
While this may not be an extremely bold call, to say that last season was a disappointing one for Newcastle United would be an understatement. Beginning with so much promise due to qualifying for the Champions League, matches and injuries piled up and the lack of depth in the squad quickly showed. A major bright spot in that was the performance of Alexander Isak leading the line. He formed an impressive partnership with Anthony Gordon and was able to show that he can score with the Premier League’s best bagging a 21 goal season.
Looking at Isak’s xG, he performed just as he should and with another season of cohesion from the Magpies, this season’s output could be even better. Isak was the most accurate shooter in the league among players who took more than 50 shots, putting 55% of those shots on target. While every shot on target isn’t equal, when you have a strong finisher who is good at getting into space and testing the keeper, good things happen.
Catching Erling Haaland, who I expect to score 30 goals, will be a tough proposition, but there’s no reason why Isak can’t bag 25 or more on his own if he stays healthy. Coming into his own as grows under Eddie Howe, Isak’s 21-goal season may look like an outlier since his next highest total was 17 goals with Real Sociedad at age 20, but this season he’ll prove that it’s actually a new trend.
Aston Villa to miss out on European soccer
Aston Villa were one of the Premier League’s surprise outfits last season, crashing the top four and securing Champions League soccer for the first time since the 1982-83 season. While it’s an impressive accomplishment, it’s one that will streach their squad depth to its limits after Unai Emery was already able to get the team to overperform expectations last season. Looking around the league, only Arsenal and Manchester City overperformed their expected goals output more than Aston Villa who scored 76 goals from and xG of 64.72.
If Villa scored closer to what was expected, they would’ve been a midtable side and that’s before getting into their busy summer. Leon Bailey and Douglas Luiz were among those chief overperformers but Luiz has now departed for Juventus with players such as Ross Barkley, Amadou Onana and Ian Maatsen coming in. For this season to work, a lot is riding on improvement from Morgan Rogers, being able to keep Bailey healthy and at least a few of these eight new arrivals in the squad hitting the ground running.
There’s a true star in Ollie Watkins and as long as he gets the ball in good areas, Villa will score their goals but everything has to come together just right to maintain last season’s success. If Villa can’t do that and Newcastle and Manchester United get closer to where they should be, it’s easy to expect a slide down the table.
Chelsea to be disappointed by Pedro Neto
When healthy, Pedro Neto is one of the most electric players in the Premier League. The issue is that Neto has only logged more than 1000 league minutes in two instances of his career despite being a large part of the setup when healthy. Neto has been impressive when on the pitch logging 11 goals and 19 Premier League assists during five seasons with Wolves, but Chelsea’s investment is as if they’re buying a starter on the wing and not a squad player.
Neto’s underlying metrics show that he could regress as well, assisting nine goals from an xA of 3.7. Add that to Chelsea’s unsettled squad along with competing with four players just to start at his position and there isn’t a lot to love here. This applies to most things around Chelsea where Todd Boehly is throwing money at the wall and seeing what sticks, but when purchases for long-gone managers Graham Potter and Mauricio Pochettino are still plodding away, heavy investment for new manager Enzo Maresca means too many new faces at Stamford Bridge.
Even if Neto can make it through the season healthy, Chelsea will need a tremendous output to justify the reported $69 million fee for his services. History suggests that the Blues will get around 25 games out of Neto this season so they’ll have to use them wisely.
Bournemouth to challenge for Europe
Speaking of boldness, it doesn’t get much bolder than the Cherries. Already vindicated in their decision to move on from Gary O’Neil and hire Andoni Iraola, Bournemouth will now have to replace quite a lot of attacking production from Dominic Solanke, who moved to Tottenham over the summer. It can come from a few places as his replacement is already on the roster in striker Enes Unal if the forward can stay healthy. Appearing in 16 league games for Bournemouth last season, Unal scored two goals and assisted two more but history suggests that he could score 15 goals leading the line.
Alongside him, more will be needed from wingers such as Antoine Semenyo but that’s where Iraola’s tactics come into play. Bournemouth wants to play on the front foot pushing the pace with shrewd movement in possession so there will be space for players to contribute. Adding a talented young player like Dean Huijsen in defense will also improve their play in possession when he gets adjusted to the Premier League giving Iraola more options of how to build up in attack.
There may not be a bonafide star in this side but that’s what will make the Cherries even more dangerous. Any member of the squad could hurt you on a given day and it makes them so hard to gameplan against.
