Liverpool’s winning start to the new season continued. They overcame Burnley 2-0 at Anfield thanks to goals from Diogo Jota and Sadio Mane. Liverpool scored twice in each half in front of a sold-out Anfield crowd for the first time since their title-winning season in 2019/20.
Jack Grealish in action against Norwich City.
Manchester City kicked off their season with a 5-0 hammering of newly promoted Norwich City at the Etihad. Grealish scored his first goal for City against the outclassed Canaries on his Premier League home debut, one of three goals set up by Jesus for his teammates. The Brazil striker has been linked with a move away from Etihad Stadium in order to free up finances for the purchase of Tottenham Hotspur’s Harry Kane, but Guardiola praised Jesus’ contribution from the right flank.
Romelu Lukaku celebrates after scoring his debut goal against Arsenal over the weekend.
Chelsea’s record signing made an immediate impact on his second Chelsea debut, netting the first goal in the Blues’ 2-0 triumph over Arsenal after only 15 minutes. The 28-year-old dominated his battle against Arsenal’s centre-back duo in what proved to be a major mismatch, and it was the perfect start for a guy who needed less than 90 minutes to show what he can add to this Chelsea side.
Tomáš Souček and Issa Diop celebrate West Ham’s goal against Leicester.
Michail Antonio and Said Benrahma led the Hammers to a commanding 4-1 victory in front of a raucous London Stadium crowd on Monday night. The result puts West Ham on top of the Premier League standings two games into the 2021-22 season. More crucially, they are still on six points with Chelsea, Liverpool, Tottenham Hotspur, and Brighton.
Meanwhile, with the help of OPTA stats we have gathered some mouthwatering stats from the weekend’s action.
- 2 – West Ham ended the day top of the Premier League for only the second time ever, after also doing so on August 22nd, 2006. Summit.
- 41 – Romelu Lukaku posted a non-penalty expected goals figure of 1.41 against Arsenal, the highest return of any player in the Premier League so far this season. He has put up a higher figure only eight times in 325 games in Europe’s top five leagues.
- 20 – Mikel Arteta suffered his 20th defeat as Arsenal manager in the Premier League, in what was his 60th game – while Arsène Wenger didn’t register his 20th defeat with the Gunners in the competition until his 116th game.
- 0 – In what is their 118th campaign in England’s top four tiers, Arsenal have opened a league season with two defeats and no goals after two matches for the first time in their history.
- 27 – Manchester United are unbeaten in their last 27 away Premier League matches (W17 D10), equalling the longest away unbeaten in English top-flight history, set by Arsenal between April 2003 and September 2004.
Neal Maupay points to the sky in celebration after opening his account for the season.
- 4 – Mason Greenwood is the fourth teenager in Premier League history to score in his team’s opening two games of a season, and the first to do so since Alan Smith for Leeds United in August 2000.
- 1 – Tottenham have only lost one of the previous 44 Premier League games in which Dele Alli has scored (W34 D9 L1), losing vs Man Utd in December 2019.
- 300 – Hugo Lloris is set to make his 300th Premier League appearance for Tottenham; the most of any Spurs player in the competition’s history (Darren Anderton, 299).
- 23 – Since Pep Guardiola joined Manchester City ahead of the 2016-17 season, there have been 49 Premier League games won by a margin of 5+ goals; the Spaniard’s side are responsible for 23 of these (47%).
- 2 – Demarai Gray has scored in back-to-back league appearances at Elland Road, though these games have come 2,149 days apart (previously in October 2015 with Birmingham City).
Harry Kane warming up on the sidelines in the match against Wolves.
- 4 – Danny Ings is the fourth player to score in both of his first two Premier League appearances for Aston Villa, after Dalian Atkinson in 1992, Dion Dublin in 1998 and Ross Barkley in 2020.
- 5 – Mateusz Klich has scored five Premier League goals, as many as all other Polish players combined in the competition’s history.
- 1 – Dominic Calvert-Lewin has scored his 55th goal for Everton in all competitions, while his opener against Leeds was his first from the penalty spot.
- 48 – Virgil van Dijk has now made 48 Premier League appearances for Liverpool at Anfield, losing none of those games (W43 D5); only Lee Sharpe played more home games for one club in the competition without losing any of them (59 with Manchester United).
- 1 – Diogo Jota’s opener for Liverpool was his first Premier League goal at Anfield since November 2020 versus Leicester; indeed, each of his previous six goals in the competition had come away from home.