Premier League Hits and Misses - Matchday 1

Hit - Liverpool

Liverpool endured a slow start to their first Premier League match under Arne Slot before turning Portman Road into a shooting gallery in the 2nd half. Having not registered a single shot on target in the 1st half, Liverpool were under pressure at the break after seeing Ipswich’s Jacob Greaves and Omari Hutchinson have the best chances of the game.

Liverpool then kicked into gear in the second half where they were able to expose Ipswich’s press with some clever passing. Mohamed Salah found himself in more 1-on-1 situations and this led to the opener, after Trent Alexander-Arnold’s precise through ball saw Salah layup Diogo Jota at the back post on the hour mark. 

Liverpool made it 2 just 5 minutes later and Salah got himself on the scoresheet, after he poked home Dominik Szoboszlai’s neat through ball. This goal now puts Salah 1st among goalscorers on matchday 1 of the Premier League with 9 goals, overtaking greats Alan Shearer, Wayne Rooney and Frank Lampard. 

The Reds will certainly take that result but the 1st half will be a concern. Although it’s not unusual for any team to begin slowly, they got the job done and could have easily won the game by 3 or 4 goals in the end. They’ll be aiming to have their 2nd half performance stretch over 90 minutes when they go back to Anfield to face Brentford on Sunday.

Miss - Tottenham Hotspur

Tottenham began their season away at Leicester on Monday night and appeared to be in full control when Pedro Porro put them 1-0 up after half an hour. Tottenham commanded possession, seeing over 70% of the ball and registered more than double Leicester’s shots, but this wasn’t enough for all 3 points thanks to a familiar face;

Jamie Vardy headed in Abdul Fatawu’s cross 10 minutes after the break and was voted as man of the match. The game then turned in Leicester’s favour from then on and Tottenham struggled to create shooting opportunities, with only 2 shots to their name between Vardy’s equaliser and full time. Heung-Min Son turned in a quite disappointing display and none of Tottenham’s new signings could make much of an impact either. Dominic Solanke had a few scoring chances in the first half but failed to find the corners, whilst Lucas Bergvall and Archie Gray were brought on in the 2nd half and couldn't turn around their side’s fortunes.

They will now look on to Everton at home on Saturday where they will likely face a tougher defence despite Everton’s 3-0 opening loss at home to Brighton. If they want to be competitive at all with the teams at the top, they need to start winning immediately after all of last season’s top 4 took 3 points in matchday 1.

Hit - Brighton and Hove Albion

The Seagulls put in a hugely impressive display, beating one of last season’s best defensive teams. Fabian Hürzeler’s men produced a fantastic 90 minutes of attacking football to see off Everton 0-3 that included fine performances from new signings Yankuba Minteh and Mats Wieffer.

Goals from Karou Mitoma, Danny Welbeck and Simon Adingra were enough to win the game but with the score at only 0-1 just after the break, Everton were awarded a penalty when Lewis Dunk appeared to bring down Dominic Calvert-Lewin. The penalty was then controversially overturned by referee Simon Hooper even though Dunk’s foot clearly made contact with the Everton striker. Everton’s day then got even worse when left back Ashley Young saw red for a foul on Karou Mitoma at 0-2. 

Despite the penalty issue, Everton’s collapse in the 2nd half will be a real concern for Sean Dyche. Everton’s defence almost single handedly kept them in the Premier League last season after their hefty point deductions and this is their heaviest home defeat since November of last year. Brighton will now look to take their impressive performance and test tougher opposition with a home game against Manchester United being followed by a trip to the Emirates to face Arsenal. 

Miss - Crystal Palace

For all the hope Palace fans had for this season, this was not the most ideal of starts after they fell to a 2-1 loss away to Brentford. Having had more shots and slightly more possession, Palace’s key men couldn’t produce any goals of their own to salvage anything from the game. It was actually Brentford’s Ethan Pinnock who scored Palace’s only goal after he put the ball in his own net from close range to make the score 1-1

Palace will feel hard done by though. Shortly after a well taken goal from Bryan Mbeumo that made it 1-0, a sublime free kick from Eberechi Eze that fizzed in off the near post was disallowed. It appeared that the contact from Palace’s Will Hughes was very minimal but the referee was unable to review this with VAR, as he’d hastily blown his whistle for the foul before the ball hit the net.

Brentford will be pleased with an opening day 3 points as they look to be prepared for life without Ivan Toney who now looks set to move to the Middle East. As for Palace, they will now need to put in an impressive performance at home against West Ham on Saturday who also suffered a 2-1 loss on the opening day. The Hammers could pose a much bigger threat than Brentford who could unleash a host of new signings in their starting lineup including former player Aaron Wan-Bissaka.

Hit - Arsenal

Arsenal enjoyed a 2-0 home win against Wolves to open their season. Mikel Arteta will be pleased with his team’s attacking display but they did have their fair share of issues at the back, something they didn’t particularly suffer from last season.

David Raya had to work harder than expected to earn his clean sheet that included a fine save to deny Jørgen Strand Larsen. Arsenal conceded possession on multiple occasions in their own half that led to some good chances for Wolves. It could be said that a better team with more attacking quality may have made them pay for their mistakes. Regardless of the defensive problems, it was still a clean sheet and Arsenal’s attackers did shine, especially Bukayo Saka who provided an assist for Kai Havertz after 25 minutes and scored himself a lovely solo goal in the second half.

Arsenal will now go into a pivotal string of fixtures off the back of this win that may define their season already. They will play 3 of last season’s top 5 including Manchester City away in the next month. Not many teams have a tougher beginning to the season than that and 3 points in all of these games will be necessary to ensure they are still amongst the favourites to win the league this season.