Premier League football returned this weekend with a reduced offering. However, it was still a matchday filled with goals and drama. Here, we take a look at some of the biggest talking points.
By Sam McGuire, Premier League expert
The curse of the draw
Newcastle United are winless since their opening day victory over Nottingham Forest. Since then, Eddie Howe’s side have drawn five of their six matches. Their return of five draws is a total no other team in the Premier League can match.
The Magpies huffed and puffed against Bournemouth on Saturday but failed to capitalise on their superiority. They dominated the ball with 72% possession while also attempting double the number of efforts and having a significantly higher Expected Goals total – 1.92 to 0.75.
Yet they required an Alexander Isak penalty to restore parity after Phillip Billing had opened the scoring for the Cherries.
If Newcastle are unable to turn their dominance into victories, as has been the case so far this term, it could be a season of frustration for the Toon Army.
A continuous hot-streak
Heung-Min Son continues to break Expected Goal models. The Spurs forward has regularly outperformed his underlying metrics since moving to the Premier League and he put on a goalscoring clinic against Leicester City on Saturday.
The versatile attacker opened his account for the season against Leicester City after replacing Richarlison on the hour mark. He then finish the match the a hat-trick despite his opportunities amassing an xG total of just 0.67.
Son also landed all four of his attempts on target to complete one of the most ruthless showings of the season just as it looked as though the Foxes might take something from what was an end to end game.
The machine
Erling Haaland just scores goals. It is what he does.
Manchester City’s No.9 added to his tally this term against Wolves to make it 11 goals – five more than anyone else in the race for the Golden Boot.
The former BVB forward is on course to break the record for goals scored in a single Premier League season and he is doing it playing his own unique way. Haaland hasn’t adapted to life at the Etihad and the players haven’t really had to adapt to him.
On Saturday, he attempted just 17 passes and found a teammate 71% of the time. Haaland is not heavily involved but he’s involved enough to impact the scoreline, and that is why City added him to their ranks.
The wildcard
Eyebrows were raised when Arsenal added Fábio Vieria to their ranks this summer. The Portuguese playmaker excelled in areas usually occupied by club captain Martin Ødegaard and the Gunners had other departments that needed to be worked on.
However, the former Porto man really turned it on against Brentford, filling the void left by the absent Arsenal No.8.
His nonchalant finish – the third for Mikel Arteta’s side – capped off a fine performance. The 22-year-old had a FotMob rating of 8.2 having scored one and created one chance while finishing the game with a pass success rate of 82%. If this is a sign of things to come, the Gunners have a player on their hands.
A disappointing return
David Moyes took his West Ham United side to Goodison Park as they looked to get back to winning ways in the Premier League.
The Hammers had won just one of their six outings prior to the trip to Merseyside, a disappointing return after a summer of spending.
West Ham suffered yet another loss with Neal Maupay opening his account for the Toffees in the second half to claim all three points.
An alarming stat for Moyes is that prior to the match yesterday, Everton had averaged just 40% possession in their games this season. Against his side, though, Frank Lampard’s side had more of the ball, finishing with 53% of the possession.
This was supposed to be the season that West Ham challenged for a top four spot after adding Gianluca Scamacca, Lucas Paquetá, Maxwel Cornet and a handful of other talented players. Instead they find themselves in the bottom three with star summer signing Paquetá having a FotMob rating of 5.7 before he was replaced.
(Images from IMAGO)
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