New Season Match Preview – Week 2

The league season got off to a very entertaining start with a number of high-scoring matches and a few surprise results from around Europe. Liverpool could only manage a draw against newly promoted Fulham, and Manchester United started their new campaign in the worst possible way with a loss to Brighton. There were comprehensive wins for the likes of Bayern in Germany and Paris SG in France. This weekend sees La Liga in Spain and Serie A in Italy added to the mix.

What to look out for

On Friday the first league match of the season from La Liga will take place, where Sevilla travel to Osasuna. There are single fixtures from France, where Lille travel to Nantes and Germany, where Freiburg welcome Dortmund. There is no Friday night Premier League fixture in England, so the action comes from the Championship where two teams that were in the top division last season, Watford and Burnley, clash at Vicarage Road.

The early Premier League kick off on Saturday sees Aston Villa welcome Everton to the midlands. Both teams started with opening day defeats and both will be under pressure to get some form of result from this match. With Villa’s aspirations for this season putting additional pressure on manager Steven Gerrard.

Later in the day Arsenal take on Leicester and Brighton will be hoping to follow up their impressive performance on the opening day when they take on Newcastle on the South Coast. Manchester City will be overwhelming favourites to beat newcomers Bournemouth. And in the late kick off, Manchester United travel to Brentford knowing that they simply must improve on last week’s performance if they want to take any points away from West London.

Action from around Europe on Saturday also sees Monaco take on Rennes and Paris SG up against Montpellier with the two home teams favourites to pick up the points. In Germany, Leverkusen will be looking for three points at home to Augsburg and Frankfurt will be hoping to perform much better than last week where they lost 6-1 to Bayern Munich. 

In the first round of matches from Italy, last season’s winners AC Milan are up against Udinese looking to make a positive start, whilst city rivals Inter are away at Lecce. In Spain, the highlight of the day is Barcelona going up against Rayo Vallecano in the evening kick off, with many curious to see whether any of their new signings will be able to play.

There are two English Premier League matches on Sunday with Nottingham Forest welcoming West Ham to their stadium. We’re also looking forward to the London derby between Chelsea and Tottenham. The visitors will be looking to follow up on their very impressive transfer window, pre-season and opening day win with three points against an out of sorts Chelsea, who are yet to click into gear. In France, Lyon travel to Lorient in the early kick off and the evening match sees Marseille head to Brest. 

In Germany, the match of the day is Bayern up against Wolfsburg, although this is likely to be a very one sided affair as usual. AS Roma have improved their squad significantly in summer and they start their season away to Salernitana on Sunday. In Spain, Real Madrid travel to Almeria hoping to begin their title defence with three points.

Midweek action

Liverpool host Crystal Palace on Monday hoping for three points in their first home match of the season, having surprisingly only managed a draw on the opening day. Surely they are expected to pick up all the points from this encounter though. Monday evening also sees Napoli and Juventus in action in Italy and Atletico Madrid start their season in Spain.

Midweek European action once again comes from the qualification rounds of the UEFA Champions League, Europa League and Conference League. There are no top level domestic leagues in action during midweek.

Saturday 13/08

Arsenal vs Leicester

Arsenal started the season in a positive fashion with a solid win over Crystal Palace and will be hoping to follow that up with another three points at home this week against Leicester. Last season Arsenal won both matches against Leicester by the same 2-0 scoreline and a repeat will be very welcomed in North London. The Gunners have won their opening home match in two of the last three seasons and ended the last season with three home wins.

Leicester have had a strange summer, the only Premier League club yet to make a new signing meaning their fans are confused about the direction they are heading. They had a tough season last year with regards to injuries and inconsistency but despite that they still managed to finish in eighth place. They will be hoping to keep hold of as many of their in demand stars as possible as a fully fit Leicester squad is a tough opponent for anyone in the league.

A tricky match for both teams but one which Arsenal should be confident of winning, given the recent history between these two teams and the mood in both camps. Jamie Vardy could be decisive as Arsenal are his favourite opponents, having scored eleven goals against them, so if the Arsenal defence can nullify him they should have enough firepower at the other end of the pitch to win this.

Brentford vs Manchester United

Brentford showed a lot of fight in their opening league match as they came from two goals down to draw against Leicester City, showing that they are in good shape at the start of the season. They were very impressive for most of last season and comfortably stayed in the league, winning lots of admirers in the process. The second season is often tougher than the first for newly promoted teams so it remains to be seen whether they can maintain that level of performance and results. A key signing during the January transfer window was Christian Eriksen, who has now joined opponents Manchester United.

The Red Devils had a terrible start to the new campaign as they put in a lacklustre performance and lost 2-1 at home to Brighton. A display that was reminiscent of the end of last season. New manager Erik Ten Hag will not have been impressed by what he saw but time is running out to add to his squad and he will need to coax a performance out of his team in this match as next up for United is a trip to Liverpool. Last season United won both matches against Brentford quite comfortably so they are surely a good opponent to come up against right now.

No team lost more league matches that they started as favourites away from home than Manchester United and given what we saw last week, it would be tough to back United even against an opponent they had no real issues against last season. Brentford put in a spirited performance last week and this is their first game of the home season and they will be wanting to show Eriksen that he made the wrong choice in leaving London for Manchester. Anything less than three points for the visiting team and alarm bells will really start ringing, however.

AC Milan vs Udinese

Last season’s winners AC Milan kick off their season at home to Udinese, who finished in 12th position. That league title win was their first since 2010/2011 and they will be hoping to build on that to go on a sustained period of success. The club’s summer activity has not been what many hoped for due to takeover talks once again dominating things in the background. The Milan giants only lost three home matches all season last year and incidentally the last team to score against them at San Siro was Udinese. The last time Milan attempted to defend their title they opened with a 2-2 draw. 

Udinese changed manager in summer but had an underwhelming pre-season as their multiple new signings have taken time to settle. They will be hoping for a solid start to their season as they look for a better campaign than last year, but a trip to San Siro is far from the easiest start. Udinese have won just one of its last six season openers, which happened to be against AC Milan in 2019.

Five out of the last ten meetings between these two have ended in draws but this time the home team are strong favourites and it would be a surprise if the match ended in any result other than a home win. 

Barcelona vs Rayo Vallecano

Barcelona have had an interesting summer behind the scenes with a squad overhaul being questioned by many due to their supposed financial struggles. There are question marks over current players contracts, how the club can afford new arrivals and the attempts to get current players off the wage bill. Despite all that, the club undoubtedly looks in good shape for the new season and manager Xavi will surely be happy with the new arrivals. Pre season form was encouraging with some big wins and good performances from the new additions. 

Rayo Vallecano spent most of their pre-season in England and can be happy with the build up to the new season. They had a solid enough year last season as they finished in 12th place and will be hoping to build on that but they have a very tough start against the Catalan giants. That being said, both matches last season went the way of Rayo Vallecano, both 1-0 wins. However, prior to that, it was eight wins in a row for Barcelona. 

Barcelona are heavy favourites to start their season with an easy win and few would bet against them, doing so against an opponent that they generally have a good record against. This season they will surely want to put in a sustained title challenge having finished a distant second to old rivals Real Madrid last year and a convincing start is to be expected. 

Sunday 14/08

Chelsea vs Tottenham 

Chelsea have an excellent recent record against London rivals Tottenham and will be hoping to extend that as they meet at Stamford Bridge on Sunday afternoon. Both clubs had positive starts to the season with Chelsea just managing to beat Everton whilst Tottenham made easy work of beating Southampton. Previous meetings strongly favour Chelsea, with the record being 70-47 and 38 matches finishing as a draw. Both teams finished in the top four last year with Chelsea three points above Tottenham. 

Chelsea have won each of the last five meetings between the teams, dating back to January 2019 with Tottenham only having one draw to show for their efforts over the last ten matches. Chelsea have only lost twelve matches at Stamford Bridge over the past three seasons and haven’t lost at home to Tottenham since April 2018. The stats all favour Chelsea in the build up to this match.

Tottenham ended the season strongly and finished in the top four under Antonio Conte and he has gone on to strengthen the squad significantly this summer with additions such as Richarlison and Perisic amongst others. They will be hoping to once again finish in the top four and have a decent run in Europe and this is an early test of their credentials. 

Generally speaking this is a low scoring affair, with only two of the last ten matches breaking the over 2.5 line. The home team are understandably favourites given the history of this fixture but their pre-season wasn’t the best and Tottenham look to be in better shape than recent years, so this is likely to be a tough assignment. A narrow home win is the likeliest outcome but perhaps a low scoring draw is worth backing.

---