Category: Football (Soccer)

Palace take a risk with new manager Pierre Sage, who is tasked with building on Glasner’s unprecedented success

Guardian writers’ predicted position: 16th (NB: this is not necessarily Ed Aarons’ prediction but the average of our writers’ tips)

Last season’s position: 15th

We look at the many contenders for the English title this season, one of the big potential moves of the summer and chaos at Fifa

It’s difficult to recall a Premier League season starting amid such widespread uncertainty as this one. Half the division, including Chelsea, Liverpool and Manchester City, is under new management. The Pep Guardiola era is over and, as Jonathan Wilson put it, the Premier League has no alpha manager possibly for the first time ever.

After 25 years away, can Coventry make their return to the top division stick under Frank Lampard?

Guardian writers’ predicted position: 18th (NB: this is not necessarily Ben Fisher’s prediction but the average of our writers’ tips)

Last season’s position: 1st (Championship)

Fabian Hürzeler has lost key players including Welbeck and Van Hecke with Brighton needing squad depth to cope with the demands of European football

Guardian writers’ predicted position: 9th (NB: this is not necessarily John Brewin’s prediction but the average of our writers’ tips)

Last season’s position: 8th

Keith Andrews and the high-scoring Igor Thiago face difficult second album after outperforming expectations

Guardian writers’ predicted position: 8th (NB: this is not necessarily John Brewin’s prediction but the average of our writers’ tips)

Last season’s position: 9th

New head coach Marco Rose has a lot to live up to after last season’s sixth-placed finish while fans have a first year in Europe to look forward to

Guardian writers’ predicted position: 12th (NB: this is not necessarily Ben Fisher’s prediction but the average of our writers’ tips)

Last season’s position: 6th

In a mailbag edition of his newsletter, Jonathan Wilson answers questions about Michael Carrick, VAR and the Premier League’s new teams

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Manchester United finally seem to have something that resembles stability in the dressing room under Michael Carrick. I feel with quality signings in defence and midfield, they could mount a decent challenge for the Premier League next season. How do you feel they will fare? – Sterling.

There’s an odd sense that Michael Carrick’s level of achievement last season was at precisely the most awkward level for the board. United didn’t produce indisputably brilliant football under him but equally 12 wins and three draws in 17 games was good enough that they pretty much had to give him the job. But it’s one thing to turn out those kinds of results when the pressure’s off, you’re already out of both cup competitions and you don’t have any European football; it’s quite another to do it in the heat of a full season. United don’t have to have an especially amazing season to play 15 more games this season than they did in 2025-26.

This is an extract from Soccer Desk, a newsletter from the Guardian US. Subscribe for free here.

Unai Emery’s task seems to get harder each year, and the Europa League winners need their big signings to shine

Guardian writers’ predicted position: 7th (NB: this is not necessarily Ben Fisher’s prediction but the average of our writers’ tips)

Last season’s position: 4th

With most of their rivals changing managers, can the champions go back-to-back for the first time in more than 90 years?

Guardian writers’ predicted position: 1st (NB: this is not necessarily Ed Aarons’ prediction but the average of our writers’ tips)

Last season’s position: 1st

Mikel Arteta’s team and the Brazilian star could be a perfect match. It also could be a risk that ends in disaster

Sometimes what is needed is something different.

There is a long history in football of counterintuitive thinking being successful, of the benefits of creative tension, of adding grit to the oyster to generate the pearl, but even so, the news that talks between Vinícius Júnior and Arsenal on personal terms are progressing comes as something of a shock. Mikel Arteta’s great followers of a blueprint adding a free spirit like the Brazilian? Really?

This is an extract from Soccer Desk, a newsletter from the Guardian. Subscribe for free here.

Arsenal’s Mikel Arteta is perhaps best placed to fill the void but the coaching contenders are legion as another season looms

This used to be a land of giants. This used to be a land where big men fought. This used to be a land where Sir Alex Ferguson and Arsène Wenger tussled, then José Mourinho joined the fray. This used to be a land where Jürgen Klopp made Pep Guardiola reconsider, and he changed his style and won anyway.

Not any more. Next season will be the first since the inaugural Premier League in 1992 not to feature any of the five big managerial beasts – not Ferguson, not Wenger, not Mourinho, not Klopp and not Guardiola.