[dropcap size=small bg_color=”#16431f”]W[/dropcap]ith the new football season on its way again, there is immense pressure on every club to perform in such a way that pleases the fans, managers and directors alike. Can Chelsea recover from their Community Shield loss against Arsenal to get their title defense off to a good start? How will Premier League ‘Freshers’ Bournemouth adapt to football in the top flight? Will Norwich and Watford remember their glory days? Champions League places, Europa League places and more are at stake in the latest edition of the Barclays Premier League.
Arsenal
What to expect: Top two stardom at last! Wenger has only one win over Mourinho in 14 meetings, but Manchester City are mired in the uncertainty of a summer exodus and my bold prediction of Rooney and Depay misfiring would deny Manchester United second place.
Key player: Petr Cech. The big man has a point to prove against Courtois and Chelsea, and he’s still worth his weight in gold. Arsenal do need a better frontman than Giroud, but at least they should not have any Szczesny mishaps.
Predicted finish: A brave call from yours truly gives them 2nd .
Aston Villa
What to expect: Nothing much. They are one of just 7 sides never to have been relegated from the Premiership, but that record is in severe jeopardy.
Key player: Micah ‘Not Fabian Delph’ Richards. The new Villa signing and captain needs to offer the kind of hard-working example that his predecessor displayed, but unfortunately nobody remembers who he is after his forgettable Man City career. He could be the difference between mid-table mediocrity and relegation! It would also help if Agbonlahor got over his Heskey-itis.
Predicted finish: Sorry Villa fans, but no Benteke and no Delph makes Villa a severely unspectacular team. None of them could hit a cow’s arse with a banjo last season (and Heskey wasn’t even playing), and that was WITH Christian Benteke. WITH Christian Benteke. The Championship beckons: 18th.
Bournemouth
What to expect: These guys are like Eminem: look what they’ve been through! Years of hard plight and toil has got the Cherries into the top flight against all odds, and introduced the world to names they’d never heard of like ‘Matt Richie’, ‘Callum Wilson’ and ‘Tommy Elphick’. They’re young, fresh, probably only 60 overall on Fifa and ready to take on the elite. Bring it on.
Key player: Callum Wilson, or so I hear, scored 20 goals in 45 appearances for Bournemouth last season. He needs to revive that form against the likes of Courtois, Lloris and Cech if Bournemouth are to keep their hopes alive. Max Gradel looks like a potential steal.
Predicted finish: I would honestly love to keep them up, but Norwich and Watford have prior experience and everybody else has that extra bit of know-how. They’ll get some famous victories but go down fighting in the end: 19th .
Chelsea
What to expect: Another top class park-the-bus season. Hazard, Costa, Courtois, Ramires… the quality available to Mourinho, without mentioning the defence that barely ever allowed a striker into the penalty area last season. Costa whacks in the goals, nobody scores at the other end, Chelsea win.
Key player: Eden Hazard is one of the best in the world now, and his legacy is set to continue at breakneck pace. He will put his contemporaries to shame.
Predicted finish: Difficult to envisage anything other than 1st .
Crystal Palace
What to expect: Another solid season. Last year they made the likes of Everton and West Ham look slightly embarrassed, this season they could do the same.
Key player: If I could pick Alan Pardew I would, but Marouane Chamakh needs a top season to distinguish himself from the other laughing stock named ‘Marouane’ (clue: he’s got a stupid black mop for hair and is less co-ordinated than a donkey on a unicycle).
Predicted finish: 11th . Pardew wins the battle of the most overrated managers against Pulis, in terms of how underrated people think they are. Kind of like the Claude Makelele role.
Everton
What to expect: Better than last year. 12th is most unlike Everton, but it was surely just a blip- or are they missing Moyes more than it seemed?
Key player: Phil Jagielka. Everton are in the search for top central defenders as United come calling for the wildly over-priced Stones. In that case, it seems that Jagielka will be relied upon to get his potentially new partner up to speed at the club.
Predicted finish: Something of a return to normality pushes them up to 7th .
Leicester
What to expect: A confidence surge after they picked up 8 wins out of 9 at the death last season. It might be risky to predict another successful campaign, but Ranieri isn’t doddery enough to be befuddled all season.
Key player: Wes Morgan. Some of Leicester’s defending last season was comical, so he must work it all out with Huth and Konchesky.
Predicted finish: Quite a gung-ho claim of 15th for the Foxes.
Liverpool
What to expect: Benteke to be shelved after a couple of months, Lallana to prove his mettle and Liverpool to make ends meet without Stevie G.
Key player: Phillippe Coutinho. Liverpool have lost their maverick and the gap in his place is huge. Anything could happen if Liverpool’s wild swings in form are indicators to go by, but Coutinho is good enough to steady the ship around the abyss. Milner is too.
Predicted finish: What has the world come to when a haaard-wor’ing Scouser boy in his Scouse homeland is gone? Answer: who knows, but Liverpool will finish 6th.
Manchester City
What to expect: Another coughing and spluttering effort from a team of too-expensive footballers in front of too-rich owners. Raheem Sterling and James Milner have done the switcheroo and the latter should benefit more. Sterling is, and always has been, horrendously overrated because he is English. Aguero is brilliant, Yaya Toure is lazy, what else is new.
Key player: David Silva. It is easy to forget that City have simply outstanding world-beaters in their clunky machine. Remember that goal against West Ham?
Predicted finish: 4th place threatened last year, and may come true in this campaign. The other top teams are either flourishing or have picked up top-notch signings. City have thrown £49 million at Raheem Sterling. Yep.
Manchester United
What to expect: Consistency and discipline. Van Gaal learned last season not to emulate the blue half of Manchester after Di Maria and Falcao struggled, whereas Mata (a proven success at Chelsea) kept on thriving.
Key player: Wayne Rooney. Rumour has it he is back up front at last and itching to do what he alone of England players can do: score lots of bloody goals. Smalling to Mata, Mata to Rooney… maybe not Smalling but the point is that Rooney could score everything that Falcao missed.
Predicted finish: Some divine voice in my head tells me that United will slip up a few times and lose the race for 2nd to Arsenal. Controversial. 3rd for the Red Devils.
Newcastle
What to expect: Another close call and a million Mike Ashley death threats. Also a lot of broken toes caused by their key player…
Key player: Aleksandar Mitrovic. Genius often comes in the more controversial of figures and Mitrovic is the new bad boy of football. Red cards, butted heads and spitting at fans is all wired in as part of the Serbian’s resume, but will he score enough goals to justify the brutality?
Predicted finish: It won’t be pretty but Newcastle will cling on in 16th .
Norwich
What to expect: A tooth-and-nail fight for the returning Canaries. They need to edge it out over their rivals in the tight fixtures.
Key player: John Ruddy. He wants the England jersey, he’s in a club that will take plenty of shots on goal. What a chance to make a name for yourself.
Predicted finish: With a miraculous 0-1 victory over Everton in the final match of the season, Norwich fans flood the pitch as they secure 17th .
Southampton
What to expect: More pundit-defying success at the top, as they establish themselves as the frontrunners of the struggle between them, Stoke and Swansea.
Key player: Victor Wanyama. Have you seen how good this guy is on Fifa 15? I beat United 3-0 because of him. Anyway, he might move to Arsenal so my back-up is midfielder Sadio Mane.
Predicted finish: A snug 8th place depending on how taxing the Europa League is.
Stoke
What to expect: Long balls into the penalty area, Ryan Shawcross getting sent off more than 5 times in the season and lots of ugly 1-0 wins. What else do you expect?
Key player: Jonathan Walters. Goals aplenty needed, and he got quite a few last season. Can they score 6 against Liverpool again in the opener?
Predicted finish: 9th. That’s right, good ol’ Stoke bullying their way through mid-table again.
Sunderland
What to expect: Weird victories where there should not be any, a Tyneside double and a surprisingly positive position in the table.
Key player: Younes Kaboul. The new signing has a tendency to gift errors away, so can he step up to the plate?
Predicted finish: There’ll be a few scrapes, some niggling wins over teams like Everton and Spurs, and when the dust clears they’ll have 12th place (somehow).
Swansea
What to expect: Tough times without Wilfried Bony, but not a panic stations scenario. Quite a lot of draws and a small drop-off in mid-season, but they rally to sneak into the midst of things.
Key player: Gyfli Sigurdsson. Why did Spurs let him go? He’s a top midfielder who scores goals and works for the team like nobody else. Only a step behind Hazard and Mata.
Predicted finish: 10th. They might say goodbye to Monk soon though.
Tottenham
What to expect: More media abuse of the most love-to-hate team in recent memory. People keep saying that Spurs won’t challenge the higher rungs again, but will Man City and Liverpool keep them subdued?
Key player: Harry Kane. Who else but the headline-grabbing youngster who keeps refusing to betray the club with a move? His habit of scoring crucial goals last season will be relied upon again for Spurs to keep the momentum going.
Predicted finish: Steven Gerrard’s loss might deflate the Kop enough to let Spurs through, but City will keep them back. 5th .
Watford
What to expect: Difficult times. Watford went straight back down before and being bigger than Bournemouth as a club doesn’t mean they have more heart.
Key player: Heurehlo Gomes. Everybody remembers his stupid mistakes (like forgetting how to catch the ball against Real Madrid), but will they remember him for his heroic, relegation-defying season at Watford?
Predicted finish: 20th. No, they won’t.
West Brom
What to expect: Little to shout about for Albion, just another stint which is only remembered for Berahino scoring a few wonder goals.
Key player: James Morrison. But can he play on broken strings?
Predicted finish: 13th. Pulis wants higher but the glass ceiling is too much this time.
West Ham
What to expect: Fresh off the back of making a complete mockery out of the Fair Play League (3 red cards and the manager sent to the stands in the qualifying rounds), the Hammers struggle without Allardyce’s inspirational chewing from the touchline and Kevin Nolan wastes five hours complaining to thin air.
Key player: James Tomkins. Pretty boy Tomkins has made the best understated partnership with James Collins since Huth and Shawcross, but he’ll need to keep the comb firmly in his pocket to provide some flair to Collins’s don’t-understand-it-whack-it mentality.
Predicted finish: 14th, but they’ll be in the relegation zone for most of it.
Emmott Leigh
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