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Manchester United have troubled their neighbours in the derby in recent years, but they were dominated almost throughout by a team that knows what it is doing. The same cannot be said of Erik ten Hag, with United enduring their worst start to a league season in Premier League history. His team look compartmentalised, lack discipline and have far too many questions for a manager 18 months into his work.
Tottenham Hotspur keep their place at the top of the table after a grubby Friday night win over Crystal Palace, but Arsenal, Liverpool and Aston Villa all won to continue their own verve. Those three scored 11 goals between them against weak away teams, Eddie Nketiah’s hat-trick the standout individual achievement.
At the bottom, all three promoted clubs lost away from home, conceding 10 goals in the process. The worst result of the lot was for Burnley and Vincent Kompany, who gave Andoni Iraola his first league win as Bournemouth manager and caused questions about his own future to be asked at a louder volume.
Read my analysis on every team below (listed in table order).
This weekend’s results
Friday
Saturday
- Chelsea 0-2 Brentford
- Arsenal 5-0 Sheff Utd
- Bournemouth 2-1 Burnley
- Wolves 2-2 Newcastle
Sunday
- West Ham 0-1 Everton
- Aston Villa 3-1 Luton
- Brighton 1-1 Fulham
- Liverpool 3-0 Nottingham Forest
- Man Utd 0-3 Man City
Tottenham
Ange Postecoglou is making all this look very easy indeed. This is now Tottenham’s second best ever start to a season, with eight wins and two draws. The only other time that Spurs outperformed their current 10-game streak was when winning the First Division in 1961. Nobody should be anticipating a similar feat in Postecoglou’s first season, but that misses the point and so do all those saying “Lol, they will collapse soon because Spurs”.
“Let them dream,” said Postecoglou after the win on Friday night. “That’s what being a football supporter is all about. It’s fair to say this lot have suffered a fair bit, so I’m certainly not going to dampen that.” It’s amazing how unusual it is to hear an elite football manager say that.
For too long, supporting this club was a miserable existence. That is not to say that Tottenham fans have had it worse than Scunthorpe or Bury or Yeovil or whoever else, but there is still something deeply depressing about watching potential be trodden into the dust by a club that doesn’t even have the decency to give supporters any entertainment. There is nothing more galling for fans than paying a huge amount of money to not enjoy something and then being told forcibly that you should be grateful for the aesthetic gruel you just received.
Which is where Postecoglou comes in. Some managers build bridges through their results, of which Tottenham have had a few recently. They can be very successful, because if the results stay consistent then the bridge becomes solid. Other managers build bridges in order to get the results, of which Postecoglou is one. It can occasionally feel a little schmaltzy, all the talk of family and hugs and “No look, we just want the fans to enjoy themselves”, but in the right hands it absolutely can work.
It clearly helps Postecoglou that he has followed his opposites. They failed and so created a mandate for him to operate in his ideal laboratory conditions, a collection of players who wanted to play with a smile on their face and a fanbase that was desperate to be moved closer towards their club.
But he deserves enormous credit for the manner in which he has reinvigorated the players he inherited, allowed the new arrivals to settle in with such ease and get Tottenham supporters believing in the improbable. With five Champions League spots likely available and no European distractions, Tottenham have a shot at a marvellous first season. Right now, Postecoglou is king.
Arsenal
There may be doubts as to whether Eddie Nketiah is quite good enough to lead Arsenal’s line, and Gabriel Jesus’ latest injury has raised valid questions as to why Arsenal bought Kai Havertz rather than another striker, but the only thing Nketiah can do is take the chances that come his way.
He has struggled a bit recently; no doubt. Since his two goals against Manchester United in January, a day that felt like Nketiah’s breakout performance for Arsenal, he has only scored twice – against Fulham and Nottingham Forest this season.
He has also had precious few starts. It is far harder than people realise to deal with irregular minutes and then have the pressure to lead the line when something else goes wrong.
Nketiah is certainly good enough to make Championship-level defenders look foolish. His first two goals were poached – making the right run and being in the right place respectively to anticipate danger created by his teammate and by Wes Foderingham.
The third was pure silk, a gorgeous curled shot. I don’t know why he didn’t take the penalty to get a fourth, but Fabio Vieira presumably appreciated the gesture.
Nketiah’s ability to score goals against second-tier Premier League sides may well prove useful if Jesus is out for a while: after Newcastle it is Burnley, Brentford, Wolves and Luton. But Mikel Arteta must also look to rotate his two strikers more than he has, particularly if Jesus is going to be prone to injury through being slightly overworked – his issues do appear to be muscular. It would also help Nketiah to feel like a front-level striker rather than the backup.
Read more: Arsenal’s title challenge hinges on Eddie Nketiah and unlocking Man City’s worst-kept secret
Liverpool
This weekend gives us the perfect chance to remark upon Liverpool’s ruthless home Premier League form, continued with an oh-so-easy stroll against Nottingham Forest with all three starting forwards scoring. Liverpool have conceded three goals in their last eight league games at Anfield and have scored 17 goals in the process.
But then what’s new? Liverpool’s record against non-Big Six teams at home in the Premier League over the last two-and-a-half years is a thing of wonder. Since a 1-1 draw at home to Newcastle in April 2021, they have played 35 such matches.
Jurgen Klopp’s team have won 30 of those games, drawn three – Aston Villa, Brighton (twice) and Crystal Palace. The only defeat was against Leeds United in October 2022. Yes, we are saying that Jesse Marsch is the key to beating Liverpool at Anfield.
Read more: Jordan Henderson playing in front of 696 fans in Saudi Arabia – that’s sportswashing in action
Aston Villa
It is a long time since Aston Villa have played European football, and the Thursday-Sunday split comes with its challenges for clubs without vast squad depth. As you go deeper into the competition, as Villa surely will in the Europa Conference League, fatigue becomes an issue.
So it is just another advantage of appointing Unai Emery as your manager that Villa have the master of the game when it comes to Thursday night overperformance that combines with Sunday consistency.
Villa have lost only one of their league games that followed their five European games so far this season – that was at Anfield. They swept past Luton with three goals in the first hour. That allows you to conserve energy with the game won, exactly as they did on Sunday.
Villa’s efficiency in front of goal is also making this far easier. In Alkmaar on Thursday, four goals in the first hour. Against West Ham the week before, a two-goal lead. Emery’s side have now scored 19 times in their last six matches in all competitions.
They are now seven points ahead of Manchester United and 10 ahead of Chelsea. That makes them legitimate contenders for fifth place and Champions League football. The supporters are having the time of their lives.
Man City
This was not one of those vivid, technicolour derby trashings that passes into folklore. There’ll be no mural depicting the time an Erling Haaland brace undressed Manchester United on their own patch, no songs dreamt up to commemorate this resoundingly routine victory for the European champions.
City’s class, quality and gameplan were a million miles more convincing. Remember they arrived in a rare mini-wobble, back-to-back away defeats in the league offering rare signs of sky blue vulnerability.
Was it going to be one of those days? Haaland’s response, when Rasmus Hojlund’s tug on Rodri in the penalty area was spotted by VAR, was emphatic. He rolled the spot kick past Andre Onana and bawled at the Stretford End. Chants of “Keano” – a reference to the career-ending injury his father suffered on this ground – encouraged him to cup his ear to the crowd. Those days of red dominance are long, long gone.
City scored again after the break, a brilliant move that ended with the sublime Silva overlapping before teeing up Haaland for a header, and United’s resolve dissolved. Phil Foden added a third with ten minutes remaining. It could easily have been five or six. City have been everything Manchester United are not for more than a decade. You might as well chalk up at least another three onto that. By Mark Douglas
Read more: Man City are everything Man Utd aren’t – Erik ten Hag is no closer to bridging the gap
Newcastle
A frustrating result to end a difficult week. It began with news that Sandro Tonali was likely to receive a significant ban for his role in illegal betting – including on his own team before moving to England. It continued with a home defeat in the Champions League, one that made some sections of the home support grumble in a manner that makes you worry about growing entitlement.
Newcastle also suffered two injuries against Borussia Dortmund and followed it up with a sticky draw at Molineux despite leading twice. Eddie Howe will believe that two points were thrown away foolishly.
It’s the injuries we want to dwell on, because they ask questions of Newcastle’s summer transfer business. The owners, recruitment team and manager have got most things right since arriving at St James’ Park, but this summer they clearly prioritised certain positions. Alongside Tonali, Newcastle signed a left winger (Harvey Barnes), a right-back (Tino Livramento) and a left-back (Lewis Hall – whose loan will become permanent).
Barnes started only two league games before getting injured, second choice behind the in-form Anthony Gordon who was signed for £45m in January. Livramento has played 45 league minutes across four appearances because Kieran Trippier has been their best player this season. Lewis Hall has played nine minutes – he’s not getting in ahead of Dan Burn.
The point is this: why did Newcastle sign expensive options in three positions for which they already had stellar options? It would have been perfectly permissible if they had depth across the squad, but that’s not true. Sven Botman’s injury means that Jamaal Lascelles is back in the team (214 Premier League minutes in the whole of last season). Alexander Isak’s absence means that Newcastle are forced to cross their fingers that Callum Wilson holds up; he has a history of niggling injury issues.
Read more: How Newcastle’s ‘unassuming’ superstar Longstaff is fighting his way into England contention
Brighton
Brighton’s perennial problem in the days pre-Roberto De Zerbi was their inability to finish chances. Under Graham Potter, it became the Premier League’s running joke. They would create chance after chance and spurn the lot. Danny Welbeck and Neal Maupay were the two most guilty parties. Brighton became known as the expected goals champions.
Under De Zerbi, that issue has now shifted and the 1-1 draw at home to Fulham was a perfect example. Brighton have had more than 70 per cent in two league games this season – West Ham and Fulham. Brighton have also won neither of those matches. They also had 75 per cent possession against AEK Athens in the Europa League and lost that game too.
Interestingly, in the two league fixtures Brighton didn’t create more than 1.5 xG in either game. They had plenty of shots – 18 against Fulham and 25 against West Ham – but most of these shots were either from long range or with numerous defenders in the way and, as such, were blocked.
De Zerbi is already acutely aware that Brighton’s opponents believe that they can hit them on the counter by deploying a low block and catching Brighton midfielders and full-backs high up the pitch. Now there is evidence that Brighton are struggling to create chances against it too. Brighton haven’t won a league game since 24 September.
Man Utd
This is now Manchester United’s worst ever Premier League start, a fifth defeat in the league proving the recent late rescue acts were nothing more than a mirage, but it no longer constitutes cracked badge crisis club territory. Mediocrity has seeped into the red and white DNA and a floundering Erik ten Hag has played his part in that.
He has talked a good game since the summer but what progress have the club really made on his watch? A year ago they were walloped 6-3 at the Etihad and Ten Hag’s terse response garnered him plenty of plaudits. Here was the disciplinarian to shake the club from its torpor.
But a year and some £300m spent later, Ten Hag is no closer to bridging the gap to City and they appear to be falling behind well-managed top four insurgents like Newcastle United and Aston Villa.
Pep Guardiola’s side are some benchmark, with Rodri the midfield metronome and the sublime Bernardo Silva the supplier for chief executioner Haaland, but United were so feckless, their team selection so bewildering that their manager can’t escape his share of the blame.
We are told that Sir Jim Ratcliffe – whose investment and new ideas are imminent and will have been confirmed by their next home league game in November – intends to back Ten Hag. Surely, though, that is just canny PR so as not to unsettle the current coaching incumbent. If Sir Jim is serious about shaking things up, things will have to get better sharpish or his new football committee’s first job will be finding another manager.
What was going through Ten Hag’s head here? Raphael Varane sat on the bench while Jonny Evans started. “Tactical,” Ten Hag said before the game. But their defensive line was so deep, their back four so flat footed, that City’s buccaneering forward line was always going to make hay against them.
There was no Casemiro in midfield while Mason Mount, the man Ten Hag urged his bosses to win an auction for to offer his team some control over games, sat on the bench. Scott McTominay, a player United have been hawking around for the past three transfer windows, was preferred in his place. Predictably, there was no control. By Mark Douglas
Read more: It feels like a little bit of England has died with Sir Bobby Charlton
West Ham
There is something not quite right about the balance of this West Ham team at present, even though Jarrod Bowen so often wriggles them out of a pickle. After last weekend’s questions over the midfield balance, Moyes dropped Tomas Soucek and gave Mohammed Kudus his first Premier league start. It is true that Kudus was the brightest player, retaining possession and occasionally playing passes for wide players to run onto – that made him unique.
But an ostensibly attacking change of personnel had its limitations. With Moyes not prepared to leave Edson Alvarez and James Ward-Prowse as a two-man midfield, Lucas Paqueta was given greater defensive responsibility. That stymied his creative verve – Paqueta was too often left playing simple sideways that someone with less prodigious talent could have done.
It doesn’t help that Michail Antonio is now the first-choice striker at 33. The effort has never and will never be in question, but Antonio’s ability to hold up the ball has diminished badly and his penalty-box presence virtually non-existent on Sunday. Antonio lasted 55 minutes. Surely Moyes’ other option is to start Bowen centrally and spick an attacking midfielder.
Watching West Ham has been an experience over the last 12 months: the European endeavour, Bowen’s directness, Declan Rice’s marauding captaincy by example, Paqueta’s invention. They have stepped grossly in the wrong direction over the last few weeks, a football team with an unambitious plan that still regularly fails to pull it off. Too often they are left holding out for individual magic, either from Bowen in open play or Ward-Prowse over the dead ball.
Read more: Dominic Calvert-Lewin shows David Moyes what West Ham are missing as Michail Antonio misfires again
Brentford
The best fact of this Premier League weekend: Thomas Frank has now won more Premier League games at Stamford Bridge in 2023 than Frank Lampard and Mauricio Pochettino combined.
You cannot blame Frank for showboating a little after he won his third straight league game away at Chelsea since taking Brentford up, scoring eight goals in the process and conceding just once. In his interview with the artist formerly known as BT Sport, Frank described his side’s performance during a 2-0 win as “average at best”. Yes he did smile knowingly too.
Frank has had so much success on this ground because his team are perfectly set up to deal with Chelsea’s half-baked threat and that hasn’t changed whoever is in charge. Brentford like to play with a low block and soak up pressure. They are happy for their opponents to cross the ball into the box and actively encourage them to push central midfielders higher up the pitch, because that only creates more opportunity for their own counter attacks.
Chelsea had almost 70 per cent possession and 17 shots, but Brentford became far more confident as the game went on. And why not? This is what they are made to do. Any hint of panic after their poor run is now over.
Chelsea
It is time to face the reality: for all those compliments that Chelsea earned during their mini-resurgence, their home form remains appalling and they won’t ever kick on until it improves sustainably.
Chelsea have beaten Crystal Palace, Luton and Leeds United at Stamford Bridge in the Premier League this year and the clocks have just gone back. That is risible from a supposed top-six staple.
Chelsea continue to struggle against the low block – it doesn’t help that that was also Pochettino’s undoing at Paris Saint-Germain. They did indeed improve in recent games against Arsenal, Brighton and Burnley, but all three opponents were happy to attack Chelsea and allow them to occasionally play with space in front of them.
Starve Chelsea of that and they become stale and frustrated. Then, generally, comes the bad news. This was an exact replica of the home game against Nottingham Forest, bar Brentford sealing the result in the final minute. And it will happen again.
In these situations, a team’s cheat code is possessing a clinical striker who digs you out of the hole. So it is with apologies to Nicolas Jackson that we must point out that in the last four Premier League games he has started, Chelsea have taken 62 shots without scoring a goal. Jackson is clearly talented, but this team in this period of its development is not the best place for him to flourish and he is not the striker who will take them forward.
This week, Pochettino revealed that Christopher Nkunku may be fit to return after the November international break. You better believe that Chelsea are trying to rush him back before this season gets any worse. Qualifying for European football might depend upon it.
Wolves
Last week, we wondered whether Bournemouth might regret sacking Gary O’Neil. Now we’re ready to conclude that Wolves made a fine choice in appointing him. They are unbeaten in five games and finally looking up the table.
This was not the majority opinion when O’Neil was recruited. Supporters – with some good reason – feared that their club had merely taken the cheaper option, par for the course after letting their best midfielders leave over the summer. After a series of bigger-name, European appointments, was this not evidence that the owners had given up a little bit on the grand Portuguese project?
But everything is working fine. Wolves rank 14th and 15th for shots and shots on target per game, and 16th for shots and shots on target faced. If that second statistic might cause some concern amongst supporters, it probably shouldn’t.
Look at the fixture list: Wolves have played five home league games this season and, at the start of the weekend, Brighton were the lowest ranked of the five in seventh place.
Given that Wolves have won at Everton and Bournemouth and drew at Luton with 10 men, the chances are that they continue to move further clear of trouble between now and Christmas, even given the injury suffered by Pedro Neto. There are just too many teams consistently performing worse than Wolves right now.
Crystal Palace
Did we hear the first signs on Friday night that Roy Hodgson might just be getting a little weary of his work back at Selhurst Park?
Some Palace supporters have been expressing their concern that insufficient opportunities are being given to the club’s younger players. The average age of the starting XI on Friday was 28.2, and that includes Marc Guehi, Tyrick Mitchell and Cheick Doucoure, all of whom are 24 or under. On the bench were Naouirou Ahamada, a 21-year-old central midfielder signed from Stuttgart in January, 19-year-old summer signing Matheus Franca and academy graduate Jesurun Rak-Sakyi, a highly-rated winger. All came on.
Perhaps Hodgson was just being a little grouchy in response to the criticism for not giving these players more minutes.
“There was no disappointment today,” he said, when asked if he was happy with the performance following the heavy defeat at Newcastle. “Although, maybe the young substitutes — who we like to think we can believe in and help us to a different level – didn’t show that. They didn’t do anything for us at all, really. We became much weaker when I made the substitutions.”
Even if Hodgson was unimpressed by his younger players, it is an interesting man management technique to call them out so publicly after a defeat. Supporters shouldn’t expect any of the three to start many games in the near future. In the case of Franca, whose transfer fee could rise to £26m, that’s a little worrying.
Fulham
Fulham haven’t quite enjoyed the full Joao Palhinha experience this season, quite possibly due to the lingering disappointment of his failed move to Bayern Munich.
Last season, Palhinha was the tackle and interception champion of the Premier League, streaks ahead of any other player. Before Sunday, he had been usurped at the top of the list by Crystal Palace’s Cheick Doucoure.
And then at Brighton, we saw the full Palhinha repertoire. He will get the headlines for scoring the equaliser, but the midfielder’s work off the ball was supreme. Fulham deliberately sacrificed possession and played with a low block, but their central defence was protected in no small part by Palhinha’s efforts.
His was the most impressive statistic of any player this weekend: Palhinha made 10 tackles against Brighton. That’s the most by any player in any Premier League game this season.
Everton
Even after a woeful first half for both teams, you felt sure that Sean Dyche was delighted to face such a miserably lethargic opponent. He would be forgiven for expecting more cause to fight.
So if Everton had produced little before the break, we might diagnose that as circumspection. They lay waiting to play on the counter and then they made good on that intent against a desperate adversary.
That strategy worked because of Dominic Calvert-Lewin. Everton possessing a better centre-forward than West Ham won them the game. Calvert-Lewin has dealt with stinging and persistent criticism from his own supporters for the regularity of his niggling injuries – as if he was not as annoyed as they were – but his return to fitness and form will keep Everton up.
Sean Dyche left all three of his permanent attacking summer signings on the bench – Beto, Youssef Chermiti, Arnaut Danjuma – in favour of Calvert-Lewin flanked by two wingers. Calvert-Lewin won headers, ran channels and generally kept at least two defenders quiet. His turn and finish for the opening goal were exemplary.
Calvert-Lewin has four goals in his last six matches in all competitions. He is the international class attacker in this team and he now receives standing ovations from his crowd.
Read more: Bill Kenwright’s Hillsborough speech is how he should be remembered – a true Everton statesman
Nottingham Forest
When Nottingham Forest signed Odysseas Vlachodimos from Benfica late in the summer transfer window, it was clear that there would be a fight to end up as the club’s No 1. Matt Turner was a late alternative to Dean Henderson, whose injury issues had persuaded Forest to seek an alternative option. Vlachodimos being Greek was a slight complication, given the owner, but Turner had the shirt from the start.
Before Sunday, Turner hadn’t done a huge amount wrong. His save percentage was reasonable. There were a couple of low-value shots that Turner failed to save, but he had been starting to build some chemistry with a regularly-changing defence.
The mistake at Anfield was hardly game-defining, given that Forest lost it in the space of 10 first-half minutes with neither goal Turner’s fault. But charging out to a long ball and getting nowhere near it, thus giving Mohamed Salah an open goal, was probably the worst error by any Premier League goalkeeper this season.
And now Steve Cooper has a decision to make. There has been much upheaval in Forest’s final third this season thanks to injuries (full-backs) and stuttering form (defenders), but the suspicion is that Vlachodimos might just get the start at home to Aston Villa next weekend.
Bournemouth
Antoine Semenyo was a forgotten figure in Bournemouth’s survival bid last season. With Gary O’Neil presumably preferring to trust the attackers he had worked with for a while, the £11m January signing played only 250 minutes before the end of the season. He started two league games before mid-March, Bournemouth lost them both and that was about that.
Andoni Iraola had struggled to point towards any positives over his first two months of Premier League football, but Semenyo was one of them. The Ghanaian has now played more minutes than in his last half-season and has started double the number of games. Thanks to his bursting run and left-footed finish, he has also scored two league goals.
Semenyo was used as more of a central striker – and goalscorer – at Bristol City, but under Iraola he’s a wide forward with Dominic Solanke cemented as the centre-forward. It works because Iraola loves Semenyo’s energy when pressing high up the pitch and his directness when Bournemouth turn over possession in the final third.
That pressing has not always worked out for Iraola and it is pretty clear that the success of his tenure at Bournemouth will live and die by it improving. But against a side intent on playing out from the back and consistently looking uncomfortable doing it, Iraola finally has the victory he needed to create some faith.
Luton
As another game goes by during which Luton gave their all, offered some resistance but ultimately succumbed, it strikes that Luton’s biggest problem this season is going to be sustaining a run of results. It’s all very well coming from 2-0 down against Nottingham Forest, displaying guts and glory in the process, but if the next game roughly takes you back to where you started mood-wise then the survival bid never quite materialises.
This provokes an interesting question for Luton in January. Away from the best clubs in the league, Luton have nothing to fear. They have won one game, drawn two others and have lost four league games by a single goal.
Unlike Burnley and Sheffield United, they have rarely been humbled. Also unlike those two clubs, they barely spent any money in the summer. They could loosen the purse strings without taking unnecessary financial risks.
Until then, Rob Edwards’ challenge is to get more from the players that Luton did sign in the summer. Luton signed 13 players on permanent or loan deals in the summer – this is a squad that is pretty high on bodies. But of the eight outfield players with the most starts this season, only two were summer arrivals and one of those (Marvelous Nakamba) was on loan at Kenilworth Road last season. Edwards has given them a unexpected platform, albeit still in the bottom three. Now to rotate and make his team a little more unpredictable.
Burnley
The suspicion grows that Burnley have wasted an awful lot of money since gaining promotion. This was a club that ostensibly had two options: buy players who they believed suited the style of play in the Championship and hope that they could replicate it in the Premier League, or buy players who might offer a plan B in two or three positions.
The second plan might even have been cheaper. Burnley spent close to £100m.
The problem is this: Burnley are indeed trying to play the same way as last season: inviting the press, playing their way out, banking on a resolute defence. But not only have they discovered that Premier League attackers are a good deal better at pressing you in possession, they also have half a new team so have lost the consistency of performance that they enjoyed last season. They have lost their identity.
Burnley faced the lowest number of shots and goals in open play in the Championship last season, and also the lowest expected goals figure. This season, they look uncomfortable when playing out of defence and are allowing far too many shots.
Unsurprisingly given the loss of their top goalscorer from last season (Nathan Tella returned to Southampton after his loan), Burnley are also far less effective in attack. They are recording fewer than 10 shots per game on average and have the second lowest xG figure after Sheffield United. Not having many shots, giving away more shots and pressing high up the pitch to far less effect than last season? It’s not an ideal recipe.
At any other club, we might expect a compromise to form between ideals and the grim reality of the league position. But honestly, that’s unlikely to happen under Vincent Kompany because the club understandably built around his overperformance last season. By the time this does click, Burnley will be playing catch-up. It feels a long time since we were all – me included – were picking them to be comfortably the best of the promoted trio.
Sheff Utd
This quickly feels very futile. Sheffield United don’t win, and whenever they offer some stubborn resistance it is either quickly undone, is coupled with a complete lack of attacking impetus or both. Just another inevitable defeat.
Paul Heckingbottom is going to be sacked soon, because this cannot be allowed to continue unabated and getting rid of the manager is always the only answer. He will leave with sympathy from supporters for the way in which he has been let down by his club’s transfer market inactivity.
That merited sympathy does not automatically mean that Heckingbottom isn’t underachieving, though. Sheffield United are not just failing to pick up points – they are terrible. They have had 27 shots on target in 10 matches, which over the course of the whole season would lead to 103. The lowest in the Premier League last season was 111.
And to match that attacking lethargy? Shambolic defending. Heckingbottom’s team have allowed 79 shots on target this season – nobody else has faced more than 60. Again extend that record across a whole campaign and you get exactly 300 shots on target faced. Last season, the worst offenders in the Premier League were Bournemouth, who allowed 198 shots on target.
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