Premier League 2024/25: 5 things we learned from the third matchday of the season

New Delhi: All kinds of Premier League action on display over the past weekend as matchday three of the 2024/25 Premier League season is now in the history books. This was the final matchday before the season’s first International break when players head to fulfil their international duties. Matchday three provided us with a lot of thrills and action that kept us on the edge of our seats.

Liverpool and Manchester City continued their winning streak with comfortable wins over Manchester United and West Ham. At the same time, Arsenal and Brighton managed to keep their unbeaten record alive with a draw in their game. It was a tough weekend for the promoted sides once again as they could only manage a single point between the three of them as Ipswich managed to draw their game with Fulham.

Chelsea returned to their previous ways after a thumping victory over Wolves to grind out a draw with Crystal Palace and Everton pressed their self-destruct button in the final 10 minutes of the game and lost a game that they should’ve won against Bournemouth. While the results provided a lot of drama, let’s dive in to see what else the results of Matchday three of the Premier League taught us about the new season.

5) Amadou Onana proving to be Aston Villa’s best signing

Aston Villa made a number of moves in the recently concluded transfer window with their marquee signing being Everton’s Belgian holding midfielder Amadou Onana, who cost the Villans £50 million. They signed the Belgian to fill the void left by Douglas Luiz’s departure and he has taken to life at Villa like duck to water. He is the only new signing made by Unai Emery who has started all the games for them this season and had another wonderful showing against Leicester City over the weekend.

Once again, Onana opened the scoring for Villa, just like he did in their opening game of the season and has now already matched his goal tally from the previous season. While he was excellent in his defensive work even at Everton, he’s already proving more efficient in attacking from set-piece situations. While he didn’t have the best day defensively against Leicester, he made up for that through his attacking display. The £50 million they spent on him already seems like a good piece of business and he looks to be their best signing of the summer.

4) Will Everton face the drop this season?

Just when it seemed like Everton were finally heading towards grabbing their first points of the season, disaster struck Sean Dyche’s men and they collapsed like a house of cards at home. The Toffees threw away a two-goal lead in the last 10 minutes before the final whistle to snatch defeat from the jaws of defeat against Bournemouth. This mounts more pressure on everyone at the club after a poor transfer window and then a poor start to their final Premier League season at Goodison Park.

The Toffees were cruising towards a 2-0 victory and they should’ve been further ahead but couldn’t finish their chances consistently and that came back to haunt them when Bournemouth produced a comeback out of nowhere. After the drubbing at the hands of Spurs last weekend and a shocking loss to Bournemouth, Everton still sit bottom of the table with zero points and having conceded 10 goals in three games, more than any other team at this point. These are concerning signs for a club already in financial trouble and if they don’t pick up their form, we could see them facing the drop this season.

3) Casemiro’s Horror-show costs Manchester United

After losing to a last-minute winner against Brighton last weekend, Manchester United would’ve wanted to put in a more solid performance against arch-rivals Liverpool over the weekend but that was not to be. The overall performance of the team wasn’t as bad as the scoreline makes it look but Casemiro’s individual mistakes cost the side dearly and led them to their second successive Premier League defeat of the season. The defensive midfielder had a difficult game against Liverpool and it ended in the first half for him as he was taken off at half-time.

He was directly responsible for Liverpool’s first two goals of the game which handed the momentum to Arne Slot’s side as they were 2-0 up at home in a span of seven minutes. Those mistakes affected the confidence of the Brazilian midfielder and he was being booed by the home fans for his errors leading to Liverpool’s goals. In his 45 minutes of action, he only attained a passing accuracy of 70%, completed just a single dribble, got dribbled past twice, lost the ball on three separate occasions and won just one tackle. An evening to forget for the five-time UEFA Champions League winner.

2) Chelsea continue to struggle against low-blocks

After the highs of hitting six past Wolves last weekend, the Blues were brought back to earth following their 1-1 draw with Crystal Palace. This is a problem of the past for Chelsea as they once again continued to struggle against a team that set up a low block against them. This problem has been persisting with Chelsea across seasons and managers, having first become a thing during Maurizio Sarri’s time in charge in the 2018/19 season. Dean Henderson was phenomenal in goal for the Eagles and was on hand to deny almost everything.

Enzo Maresca’s men created quite a few chances against the Eagles but struggled to finish them off on the day and that cost them two points. Chelsea had an xG of 2.37 from their seven shots on target but severely underperformed and missed five big chances in the game. Cole Palmer was brilliant in creating the chances but both Nico Jackson, who scored the team’s only goal and last weekend’s hattrick hero, Noni Madueke failed to convert the chances presented to them and Enzo Marseca was denied his first home win.

1) Early positive signs for Arne Slot’s Liverpool

Liverpool had a memorable weekend as they beat bitter rivals Manchester United by three goals to nil, in their third match of the season, to pick up three points and make it three wins on the bounce for new manager Arne Slot. There were a lot of doubts over the Dutchman’s appointment as he was taking over from Liverpool’s cult hero, Jurgen Klopp, but there are already a lot of positives from Slot’s short time at Liverpool. Slot is the only manager other than Pep Guardiola who has won all his games of the season till now and has done so comfortably.

His Liverpool side is the only team in the league who haven’t conceded a single goal till now having kept a clean sheet in all of their games. He seems to have gotten Luis Diaz at his best with the Colombian contributing to four goals in his first three games. The game against Manchester United was his biggest test in his short tenure as Liverpool manager till now and he passed out with flying colours. The win over the weekend also made Arne Slot the first Liverpool manager to win their first meeting with Manchester United since Bob Paisley in 1975.

 We’re done with the final matchday before the International break. Dive in to find out what all we learnt from the latest round of Premier League action!  Football Sports News: Latest Cricket News, Cricket Live Score, Sports Breaking News from Sports Today