The table doesn’t lie (except when it does), part 1
The 2017-18 Premier League season kicks off this Friday. What better way to celebrate than by predicting the entire league table?
After a long summer of hand-wringing over an increasingly absurd transfer market, the Premier League returns, mercifully, this Friday. Chelsea are champions, Manchester United and Liverpool are back in the Champions League, Arsenal are out of it for the first time in two decades and Kyle Walker now costs £50 million.
The big six consolidated their hold at the top of league last season, and look set to battle it out for the title again in 2017-18. How they end up, however, is a lot harder to say. In an effort to hold myself accountable for the many dubious opinions I will share with you over the coming season, I’ve taken it upon myself to predict the entire Premier League table, and have included, in a feeble effort to hedge my bets, my degree of confidence (DoC) in each decision.
The top 10 are below. The bottom 10 come out on Tuesday.
1. Manchester City
Manchester City may never hear the end of their decision to buy Kyle Walker for £50 million, but the same seemed true of their decision to buy John Stones for £50 million, and then they bought Kyle Walker for £50 million. As the old saying goes, there’s always a more overpriced Englishman. Silly transfer fees notwithstanding, City have had an excellent summer.
Probably their biggest weakness last year was a rotating cast of full-backs with a combined age of 257, and so while Walker will certainly be the butt of his fair share of jokes this season, he improves the team in immediate and tangible ways. He’s joined by Benjamin Mendy and Danilo, who might both be better.
Ederson Moraes comes in in goal, where Claudio Bravo regularly made a fool of himself last season, but even if he hadn’t it’d be hard to imagine Bravo, or anyone, failing to save so many savable shots two seasons in a row. With a new keeper, new full-backs and Vincent Kompany fit to start the season, the Citizens defense should improve.
Finally, there’s Bernardo Silva, who appears to be Pep Guardiola’s David Silva 2.0, and in the meantime adds quality depth to an already extremely good attack that includes Kevin De Bruyne, Leroy Sane, Gabriel Jesus, Raheem Sterling and Sergio Aguero. City are going to score a lot of goals this season.
If there’s one area of weakness, it’s central midfield, where Fernandinho and a 34-year-old Yaya Toure remain the best options entering the new season. They’re both good players, but if Ilkay Gundogan can get fit and stay fit, City’s starting XI begins to look unbeatable. If all else fails, there’s always Fabian Delph.
City finished third last season, and didn’t have a great record against the rest of the top six, but they dominated for large stretches of many of those games. They were a De Bruyne tap-in away from taking a 2-0 lead against Chelsea in a game they lost, a blatant Walker foul away from taking a 3-0 lead against Tottenham in a game they drew and could have easily beaten Liverpool in both their matches, a 1-0 loss at Anfield and a crazy 1-1 draw at the Etihad.
Point being, despite finishing third, they really weren’t far off last season. On top of their good work in the transfer market, and the likelihood their luck in and in front of goal improves, City’s players have also now had a year to get to grips with the extremely specific demands of their manager. When City were at their best last season, no one could touch them. Now they’re even better.
DoC: one John Stones divided by one Kyle Walker.
2. Manchester United
No team’s 2016-17 was harder to evaluate than Manchester United’s, on account of their decision to stop trying in the league some time around the beginning of spring. That turned out to be a good decision by Jose Mourinho, the inevitability of whose victory in the Europa League final against Ajax was so profound the Netherlands men’s national team may never qualify for a World Cup again.
But United were often also simply not very good. They drew 15 games in the league, 10 of them at Old Trafford, and while some of those dropped points came down to bad luck and/or inspired opposition goalkeepers, the team clearly lacked reliable goalscorers. Zlatan Ibrahimovic scored 17 times in the league, but even he was guilty.
The arrival of Romelu Lukaku should help, but Henrikh Mkhitaryan, Juan Mata, Marcus Rashford, Anthony Martial and Paul Pogba, plus any new attacking signings, will need to chip in as well if the Red Devils’ attack is going to improve enough to challenge for the title. With the arrival of Nemanja Matic, and the knock-on effect that will have on the balance in midfield, I expect it will.
The defense is excellent, and has only gotten better with the additions of Victor Lindelof and Matic in defensive midfield. United conceded 29 goals last season, fewer than every team but Tottenham, as Mourinho provided yet more evidence that he could probably forge an elite center-back pairing out of Titus Bramble and the ghost of Luke Shaw’s confidence.
The Special One is, at least when it comes to organizing a defense, very special indeed, and there’s also the highly disturbing factoid he’s won the domestic league title in his second season at every club he’s ever managed — Porto, Chelsea, Inter Milan, Real Madrid, Chelsea again and now, perhaps, United. You may spend much of this season wanting to jump into your television and murder him live on air, but never count out Jose Mourinho. He turned a sixth-place finish last season into the best year United have had since Sir Alex Ferguson retired, for goodness’ sake. You’ve been warned.
DoC: the same amount it would have been great if Titus Bramble had played for United: very.
3. Liverpool
Liverpool’s five-month title challenge last season was forgotten pretty quickly as they crashed and burned in a fiery wreck of defensive incompetence in the opening months of 2017. The lesson from those two months, during which the Reds collected six points out of a possible 21, appears to have been that Virgil van Dijk is a cross between Franco Baresi and Jesus Christ his very self.
But the real lesson, at least to me, was that Liverpool’s gung ho attacking style isn’t going to work if they can’t trot out their best team every week, which they couldn’t in the second half last season as Sadio Mane, Philippe Coutinho, Adam Lallana and Jordan Henderson all missed time with injuries. To Jurgen Klopp’s credit, he adopted a noticeably more defensive approach in the last three months of the season, during which the Reds picked up 27 of a possible 36 points, conceding only nine goals, to finish fourth.
Liverpool’s run-in is reason for encouragement even if they don’t land Jesus Baresi before the end of the month. If Klopp strikes a more pragmatic balance between defense and attack next season against the lesser teams in the league — their six losses came against Burnley, Bournemouth, Swansea, Hull, Leicester and Crystal Palace — the Reds should be in the thick of the top four race again.
Also working in their favor is the addition of Mohamed Salah, as close to a Mane replica as anyone in the world. The Egyptian is expected to take Mane’s spot on the right of Klopp’s front three, while Mane moves left and Coutinho moves into midfield (which, come to think of it, may not jibe with that more pragmatic approach from the end of last season).
While Coutinho is the Reds best player, the balance of their team was thrown off most significantly last season by Mane’s absence. Without the Senagalese winger, Liverpool had no pace out wide, and no real threat in behind. Roberto Firmino’s crucial to the Reds’ success, and one of the most underappreciated players in the top flight, but he’s never going to be that guy. Salah’s arrival provides much-needed cover in their greatest area of need.
Add to that the return to fitness of Henderson, Joe Gomez, Marko Grujic and (maybe, probably not) Daniel Sturridge, the arrivals of Andrew Robertson and Dominic Solanke, the emergence of Trent Alexander-Arnold as a viable backup to Nathaniel Clyne, and the squad looks a lot deeper than it did last season, even without van Dijk, and should be able to cope with the extra demands of Europe.
The Reds have proven beyond doubt they can consistently beat their rivals in the top six. If they learn the right lessons from the second half of last season, they should be able cut out the stupid losses to bottom-half sides, and retain their place in the Champions League places.
DoC: one out of 10 Daniel Sturridge fitness updates.
4. Tottenham
The story of Tottenham’s summer is that while all their rivals were getting gleefully fleeced by the Premier League tax, they were busy doing nothing. Mauricio Pochettino’s side have bought zero players, and sold one of their starters, Kyle Walker, whose very good backup got injured in the last game of preseason and will now miss the start of the campaign.
All things considered, Spurs’ lack of activity is understandable, given the strength of their starting XI, and the fact they can’t splash out Manchester City/United-sized sums on starting XI-quality players. The transfer market’s an unforgiving place for teams who are only in it for backups. Nonetheless, the squad looks thin. Erik Lamela isn’t expected back until October, Danny Rose and Kieran Trippier are injured, Mousa Dembele is returning from foot surgery and the drop off in quality should one of the starting front four get injured is alarming.
Vincent Janssen may well be better than he played last season, but he’s nowhere close to Harry Kane’s level, while Moussa Sissoko seems set for another season spent on the bench, still daydreaming, presumably, about Euro 2016. They apparently might buy Ross Barkley, who’s fine, but it’s hard to imagine he’s going to put this team over the edge.
The starting XI is excellent, and Mauricio Pochettino’s ability to transition between a back three and a back four could be a big difference maker against the other teams in the top six. But after two seasons of near-misses, it’s fair to ask whether Tottenham’s window has closed, with the Manchester clubs flexing their financial muscle yet again, and Spurs’ obviously loath to spend the more limited amount of money at their disposal.
To be clear, Tottenham are going to be very good. They scored the most goals and conceded the fewest of any team in the league last season, and only lost one player who contributed meaningfully to that success. And unlike Liverpool and Chelsea, they did it while playing in Europe.
But squad size is a serious concern, even more so if they hope to actually compete in the Champions League this season. Like Chelsea, they had only 12 players start more than 10 games last season, and only 15 appear in more than 10. Also like Chelsea, they’ve done nothing to strengthen the squad this summer.
Tottenham’s key attacking players are all under the age of 25, but their key players everywhere else are no longer spring chickens, which is simply to say it’s not a guarantee they’re going to keep getting better. They finished last season on 86 points, the joint second-highest total ever for a Premier League runner-up. Can they top that, as they will probably have to to win the league? My money’s on no.
Then there’s the move to Wembley, where they won only once in five tries last season. That shouldn’t affect them, really, but it’s one more headache their rivals don’t have to worry about. They play Chelsea in their first game at the national stadium on Aug. 20. The result of that match will obviously not decide where either team ends up, but it feels about as important as any second game of the season ever could.
DoC: six out of 10 Moussa Sissoko daydreams.
5. Chelsea
The Blues may have had the worse summer of any team in the top six. There’s still time, and they’re being linked with plenty of excellent players, but as it stands the champions’ squad is worse than it was last season. It seems Diego Costa is determined to remain on vacation until Chelsea allow him to join Atletico Madrid, who he can’t play for until January anyway. And while Alvaro Morata projects to be a very good player, he’s replacing a man who scored 20-plus goals in each of Chelsea’s past two title triumphs, and will need time to adapt to a new team and a new league. Morata’s also only 24, and has yet to play a full season as his team’s first-choice center-forward.
In midfield, where Tiemoue Bakayoko comes in for Nemanja Matic, it’s a similar story. Bakayoko, 22, may be an even more exciting talent than Morata, but he’s replacing one of the Blues’ most reliable and consistent players, and will need time to adapt. N’Golo Kante, superhuman that he is, will make the transition easier, but it’s unlikely to be seamless.
Also, Bakayoko’s injured to start the season, meaning Cesc Fabregas is likely to play in midfield next to Kante, as he did in the Community Shield on Sunday. That switch sacrifices defensive stability for more incisive passing from midfield — not a bad idea, but one that could backfire with Marcos Alonso and Victor Moses as wing-backs.
Antonio Rudiger adds another quality option to the back three, but with John Terry, Nathan Ake and Kurt Zouma all gone, the defensive depth isn’t very deep. Which is the big problem. Conte relied last season on a tiny squad. Only 12 outfield players started more than 10 games, and only 15 made over 10 appearances. Three of them — Ake, Terry and Nathaniel Chalobah — are no longer at the club.
To make matters worse, Eden Hazard will miss the start of the season as he continues to recover from a fractured ankle sustained in Belgium training at the beginning of the summer, and Pedro’s playing with a broken face. Willian’s a wonderful player, and an excellent stand-in for Hazard, but Conte may find himself having to rely on Michy Batshuayi and Morata more than he’d like in the early going. The season is long, and there will be plenty of time for Chelsea’s best players to get fit, but if the battle among the top six is as close as it was last year, a poor first month or two could prove the difference between a title challenge and a fight for the top four.
On top of all that, the Blues’ 3-4-3 showed signs of vulnerability at the tail end of last season. That was likely partly due to the size of their lead in the title race, and the minor complacency in which that (understandably) resulted, but their performance in the FA Cup final against an inferior Arsenal team was particularly troubling. There’s no question Chelsea’s starting XI is very, very good, but if they don’t strengthen before the end of the window, they’ll start the season with the most unconvincing squad in the top six.
DoC: 0/minus-100 if they buy, as they inevitably will, six players on transfer deadline day. In that case, flip them and Tottenham. Or Liverpool. Or Tottenham. Or Liverpool.
6. Arsenal
There seems to be an idea going around Arsenal are bad now, which they are not. The Gunners were just as good last season as they have been for most of the past decade. The teams around them simply got better. That’s the current reality of the Premier League: two very good teams will miss out on the top four.
Arsenal also, if you ignore the fact they appear to be keeping their best, and possibly also second best, player against his will, have had a very good summer. Alexandre Lacazette isn’t a sure thing, arriving as he is from Ligue 1, but appears to be exactly the sort of player they need, like if Danny Welbeck could finish, or Theo Walcott was the player he thinks he is. Lacazette’s arrival means Alexis Sanchez, if he stays, can move back into attacking midfield, where he will be joined, if he stays, by Mesut Ozil, who thrives playing with forwards, like Lacazette, who can stretch a defense.
Rob Holding has become a solid option on the right of Arsene Wenger’s new back three, Sead Kolasinac adds more depth on the left of defense and if Granit Xhaka picks up where he left off last season, the Gunners are in good shape in central midfield, especially if Santi Cazorla gets fit in time for their usual mid-season slump.
The Thursday-Sunday Europa League slog won’t make things any easier, but as Mourinho
showed last season, the lesser European trophy can be a blessing, and the Gunners have a deep enough squad to make it worth the trouble.
Arsenal were a very good team last season, and they’ll be a very good team again this season. They could easily finish in the top four. Their placement here comes down to this: I think they’re worse, all things considered, than the five sides above them. But they’re also more predictable than the five teams above them. In the event it becomes clear, say, Chelsea aren’t going to make the top four, it’s likely they’ll take their foot off the gas, a la Manchester United last season, leaving Arsenal to jump up a spot. In terms of talent, though, they’re sixth, especially if Sanchez goes.
DoC: three fourth-place trophies out of 10.
7. Everton
Everton picked a really terrible time to get good. The Toffees are comfortably the best team in the league outside the top six, but when I start wondering whether they might make the leap this season, I like to play a game called, “Which Everton Players Would Start for Any of the Teams Above Them?” The game works like this: none of them.
That’s probably unfair. Jordan Pickford, raw though he is, might be better than Liverpool’s Simon Mignolet and City’s Ederson, while Michael Keane could be better than a a lot of the center-backs above him, but he still has a lot to prove playing for a team that don’t put all their players behind the ball at all times.
Davy Klaassen is an exciting signing, and should adapt well, but beware the Eredivisie curse. Yannick Bolasie, whenever he returns from injury, will be one of the funnest wingers in the league, but with the possible exception of Manchester United, the front three at every team in the top six is a level above what Everton have to offer. Even Gylfi Sigurdsson, who may arrive later this month, wouldn’t start ahead of his closest counterparts in the top six: Cesc Fabregas, Kevin De Bruyne, Christian Eriksen, Philippe Coutinho and Henrikh Mkhitaryan/Juan Mata.
This is an exciting time to be a Toffees fan, and if any of the top six have a 2015-16 Chelsea-style malfunction you’d expect them to capitalize. But if Ronald Koeman’s going to oversee a Spurs-style transformation, he’ll need more time. United showed us all last season why no one’s too good to take the Europa League seriously. The Everton manager should take note.
DoC: 100 percent.
8. Bournemouth
The gap between seventh and eighth last season was 15 (15!) points. The gap between eighth and 17th was six (six!) points. That tells you everything you need to know about how dominant the top seven were last term. There’s really no reason to think things will go much differently in 2017-18. But of the teams vying for eighth spot, the one with the most encouraging combination of stability, talent and tactical coherence is Bournemouth.
Eddie Howe’s side conceded 67 goals last season, the fifth-worst mark in the league, but there a reasons to think they’ll be better at the back in 2017-18. The obvious ones are the additions of Nathan Ake and Asmir Begovic from Chelsea. Ake was excellent for the Cherries during his time on loan there last season, while keeper Begovic replaces Artur Boruc, who the club are probably going to have pry off his line with spatula before getting him to sit on the bench.
The most encouraging thing about Bounemouth’s 2016-17 was the way they responded to an extended dip in form in January and February. Howe’s side went winless in eight games, losing four in a row at one point by a combined score of 12-4. The turning point came at Old Trafford in March, when the Cherries came back from a goal down before holding on to draw, despite having a man sent off in the first half.
From then, they picked up 19 points from the remaining 33 available, with their only two losses coming against Chelsea and Tottenham. Excluding those two games, the Cherries conceded eight goals in nine matches, a sign of a more defensive approach from Howe. One of the big questions about the young English manager was whether he could pivot away from his preferred style of open, attacking soccer when necessary. He showed he could last season, albeit in a very limited sample size.
There are more talented teams in the league than Bournemouth, but a lot of them have new or bad managers and will spend the season ironing out various tactical wrinkles. The Cherries seem well-placed to capitalize.
DoC: there-were-six-points-separating-eighth-and-17th-last-season out of 10.
9. Southampton
Southampton, who seem on paper to be about the eighth best team in the league, finished eighth last season, made it to a cup final and sacked their manager, Claude Puel, anyway, for reasons that are not entirely clear. Fair enough.
In comes Mauricio Pellegrino, formerly of Liverpool, and something of a Rafa Benitez disciple, having played for him at Valencia before moving to Anfield just in time to be cup-tied for their Champions League victory in 2005.
Southampton’s summer has been dominated by the Virgil van Dijk transfer saga, so it’s probably worth pointing out van Dijk played only 21 league matches last year, and there’s little evidence to suggest the Saints will seriously miss the Dutchman. They picked up 24 points in 22 matches with him last season, and 19 in 16 without. Jack Stephens proved to be an able deputy alongside Maya Yoshida, who never seems to get the credit he deserves, while the full-back combo of Ryan Bertrand and Cedric Soares is excellent.
In attack, Dusan Tadic, Nathan Redmond, Sofian Boufal, Manolo Gabbiadini and Charlie Austin (if fit) should combine to dangerous effect, while Oriol Romeu, Jordie Clasie and James Ward-Prowse are all solid options in central midfield.
So again, this is a good team. They might even have the talent to challenge Everton for seventh place, but Pellegrino will need time to get accustomed to life in the Premier League, so their league position takes a hit here.
DoC: Virgil van Dijk’s future transfer fee out of 100 million.
Next: The preseason Premier League interesting rankings
10. West Ham
The Hammers had an eye-catching, slightly strange summer, bringing in Joe Hart (on loan), Pablo Zabaleta, Marko Arnautovic and Javier Chicharito Hernandez. Five years ago, those were the caliber of signings that would have a mid-table club dreaming of a run at the top six. Not so much anymore. Still, with the exception of Zabaleta, whose game has not aged well, those players should make the team better.
But they’re not joining much of a team to begin with. West Ham’s 2016-17 season was defined primarily by their move to the worst stadium in the entire world, and secondarily by the decision of their best player, Dimitri Payet, to leave the club, I’m guessing after taking a long hard look look at Simone Zaza and deciding east London wasn’t for him.
West Ham confuse me very much. They’re sort of talented — Arnautovic and Manuel Lanzini could form an excellent attacking midfield duo, while Chicharito should get double-digit goals — but I don’t understand what the plan is. Does Slaven Bilic have a style of play? Can Michail Antonio score 100 headed goals two seasons in a row? It seems unlikely.
Also, the defense was terrible last season, and especially bad when the Hammers had a lead to defend. Hart could theoretically bring some leadership and a winning mentality — ditto Zabaleta — but also that’s the sort of intangible nonsense people tend to focus on when players aren’t actually very good. Aaron Cresswell regressed last season, Jose Fonte’s even older than Zabaleta, Winston Reid is … well, he’s not Bobby Moore.
In midfield, Cheikhou Kouyate is pretty good and Mark Noble’s been around the block, but are these the sorts of players that can either consistently protect the aging defenders behind them or reliably get the ball to the feet of their more talented teammates in the final third? I’m not convinced.
Without the shock of moving into a new stadium they obviously hate, and with the arrival of at least one legitimately good Premier League player (Arnautovic), the Hammers should get better this season, but they’re not great, and even Southampton, who are on their third manager in three seasons, have a more coherent identity on the pitch.
DoC: spiritually, they’re already 10th.