For our weekly column
of knee-jerk reactions, here are six conclusions we’ve come to
based on the latest weekend of action in the Premier
League.

We usually prefer to reserve judgement, take our time over
things, and delve deep into the data before making sweeping
statements.

But we also enjoy this weekly column where we look back at the
weekend’s Premier League action and come to some conclusions that
are probably just a little bit hasty.

So, without further ado, here are six knee-jerk reactions to the
latest round of fixtures.

Liverpool Are Back (and So is Mo)

There has been a lot of writing off of Liverpool
and Mohamed
Salah recently. After four consecutive league defeats, Arne
Slot’s side were, apparently, finished. And Salah, after a six-game
goal drought in all competitions across September and October, was
past it.

Lo and behold, the reigning Premier League champions and the
player who last season topped the charts for both goals
and assists aren’t, in fact, rubbish after all.

It was only one win, and it was far from the most convincing
we’ve seen from Liverpool under Slot. They rode their luck at
times, with Villa carrying a decent threat against a defence
lacking in confidence, twice hitting the woodwork.

But it was a crucial win to end their dreadful losing streak,
and it came against a team who had won their previous four league
games, including beating Manchester City last time out. It didn’t
really matter how Liverpool won this one, so it isn’t all that
relevant that they weren’t at their best, but there is certainly
plenty to say for keeping a clean sheet and beating a team as good
as Villa.

Similarly, Salah’s goal was one of the easier ones he’ll score,
cutting out an awful pass from Villa goalkeeper Emi Martínez to
finish into a near-empty net, but it follows on from a quality
finish against Brentford last week to make it goals in back-to-back
games. With his goal, he moved level with Wayne Rooney for the

most goal involvements for a single club in Premier League
history (276).

All of a sudden, Liverpool are third and Salah is joint-sixth in
the top scorers’ list on four goals. Catching Arsenal remains
unlikely, but the defending champions are still one of the best
teams in the country, and if anyone can create a title race this
season, it’s them.

Rice is
the Best Midfielder in the World

Declan
Rice just seems to get better and better with every passing
week, and this weekend he put in yet another exceptional
performance that might just have cemented his spot as the most
complete midfielder in world football.

He only did it against Burnley, who could well be back in the
Championship next season, but in this well-oiled Arsenal machine
that wins every week, barely concedes any chances – let alone goals
– and looks in no way reliant on a single player, Rice increasingly
appears to be their most important figure.

That’s because he can do it all, and he showed as much against
Burnley. As he has done to such devastating effect this season, he
put in a wicked delivery from a corner for an Arsenal goal – the
opener scored by Viktor Gyökeres’ – and then scored a lovely header
of his own to double the lead.

He completed 91.3% of his passes, and made five tackles, three
interceptions and four clearances. It was the complete performance,
the type of which we have grown accustomed to seeing from Rice.

He does so much for the team, both with and without the ball,
and has become irreplaceable in Arsenal’s midfield. They have much
better depth this season, but Rice probably remains the one player
they simply cannot do without.

Cherki
Can Take the Premier League by Storm

We have neither seen enough of Rayan
Cherki since his summer move to Manchester
City, nor have we seen anything like enough of him at his
best.

But on Sunday afternoon at the Etihad Stadium, he produced his
best performance in a City shirt and the clearest indication yet as
to the quality he brings to Pep Guardiola’s team.

As well as countless deft and clever touches, the type of which
you only see from true maverick midfielders, there were two
first-half assists for Erling Haaland goals. Across all
competitions in 2025, Cherki has now registered 2+ assists in five
different matches, the most of any player for a side in Europe’s
top five leagues.

For both assists, the France international put his new teammate
clean through which, based on Haaland’s form this season, is
basically a guaranteed goal. The indications from this game were
that he can strike up a winning partnership with Haaland, and that
in turn would essentially guarantee Cherki success.

There were also a few careless moments when he would try things
that only an inexperienced yet supremely confident and creative
player would that ended up giving possession away cheaply,
including one, with the score at 2-1, that very nearly led to a
Bournemouth equaliser.

But this was only his second Premier League start, and there may
only be improvement from here.

Tottenham Are Broken and Thomas Frank Can’t Fix
Them

Just 0.10 expected goals. That’s the total xG that Tottenham
put up in their meek defeat to Chelsea on Saturday night.

It was the lowest by any team in a Premier League game this
season. It was also the second lowest by Tottenham in any Premier
League match in Opta’s record books, which for this particular
metric go back as far as 2012-13. The only game in which Spurs have
posted a lower xG total was an away defeat to Crystal Palace in
September 2021 (0.06 xG), when they played more than a third of the
match with 10 men.

“I have never been in charge of a team that has created that
little in one game,” manager Thomas Frank reflected afterwards.

xG isn’t for everyone. Interim Celtic manager Martin O’Neill
recently called it “total nonsense,” going on to say, “some people
just use these words to try to sound clever.”

In the interests of deducing how bad this weekend was for
Tottenham and not (only) to try and sound clever, there is a lot to
glean from their miserable xG total.

In its simplest terms, statistically speaking, Spurs could have
played out this exact performance against Chelsea 10 times before
they created enough chances to score one goal. In other words, if
they’d carried on playing as they were, they would have needed 900
minutes, or 15 hours, or almost two-thirds of a day, just to score
once.

They have overperformed compared to their xG more than any other
team in the Premier League this season, but given they can no
longer rely on the world-class finishing of players like Harry Kane
and Son Heung-min, they need to start creating better chances. The
evidence of Saturday’s pitifully inadequate attacking performance
suggests Frank might not be the man for the job.

Welbeck
Deserves an England Recall

It admittedly doesn’t take that much for Danny
Welbeck to be in the goalscoring form of his life, but he has
been enjoying a run in front of goal that most strikers would be
delighted with.

His strike in Brighton’s 3-0 win over Leeds on Saturday took him
to six Premier League goals for the season. Only runaway leader
Erling Haaland (13) has scored more.

But what is most remarkable about Welbeck’s run is how efficient
he has been. His half-dozen goals have come from just 14 shots (one
of which, as the below graphic shows, was from his own half) and,
astonishingly, just eight shots on target. Despite now being 34
years old, and turning 35 later this month, he is as effective as
he has ever been.

England don’t have tonnes of options up front, and other than
Harry Kane, they have very, very few in-form goalscorers. Other
than Kane (12) and Welbeck (six), the only other English players
with three or more goals in Europe’s top five leagues this season
are Mason Greenwood (seven), who isn’t going to get a call-up any
time soon, Burnley’s Jaidon Anthony (four), West Ham’s Jarrod Bowen
(three), Toulouse centre-back Charlie Cresswell (three) and
Udinese’s former Aston Villa striker Keinan Davis (three).

Thomas Tuchel could do a lot worse than turn to Welbeck for the
World Cup next summer.

This is
Where Wolves’ Season Turns

For a fifth year in a row,
Wolves have made a managerial change. This weekend, after
taking just two points from 10 games at the start of this season,
Vitor Pereira was sacked despite all the fine work he did last
term.

Quite a lot of people have quite understandably grown tired of
their way of doing things. It’s hard to have much sympathy with
Wolves for their lowly position when they hire and fire managers so
willingly.

But no matter what you think of it, you can’t deny that it
works. They have finished no lower than 16th and as high as 10th in
each of those recent years in which they have changed manager.

However, after such an awful start to 2025-26, they are very
much up against it this time. Each of the five previous teams to
earn two or fewer points from their opening 10 matches of a Premier
League season have been relegated, and each of the last four have
finished bottom.

If Wolves’ recent history is anything to go by, Pereira getting
the chop will be the moment that their season turns around. Whether
they can do enough to survive this time is the big question.

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