The World Cup is over and the Premier League is back: Five things to look out for as England returns to action

As one titanic tussle for sporting supremacy concludes, another returns to the stage. But that is quite enough about the fourth round of the Carabao Cup even if it does have Manchester City and Liverpool squaring off on Thursday. Don’t you know there’s an English footballing tradition that must be resumed come hell or high water? And so, eight days after the World Cup reached its dramatic denouement in Lusail, the Premier League returns with its traditional Boxing Day feast of leftovers, sub-prime cuts and that pudding that no one could stomach the first time around. If you thought that Qatar 2022 was a slog for players, coaches and viewers, just wait until the FA Cup third round rolls around, the once highpoint of the sport’s calendar now reduced to reserve on reserve action.

Anyway for those of you whose synapses were thoroughly fried by Lionel Messi, Kylian Mbappe et al, here’s a reminder of where we left the Premier League at the 14 game mark.

1. Can surprise leaders Arsenal stay ahead?

There were plenty, me included, who thought Arsenal were bound to improve this season. Perhaps not even Mikel Arteta could have imagined the great strides his side were about to take however. Through 14 games their record reads 12-1-1, the six teams to have 37 points through their first 14 games have all gone on to win the title but then only one of them, Liverpool in 2019-20, had Manchester City breathing down their necks.

Their position at the table certainly isn’t a false one, according to Twenty3 their non-penalty expected goal difference is the best in the league at 18 to City’s 14.3. Opta somewhat favors City, Understat has Arsenal ahead by a nose: any model you care to examine agrees on one thing, there is the top two and then a big gap. In the first third of the season, Arteta and his players should have done enough to secure Champions League qualification. To get 75 points, for instance, they need only stagger along at the pace of a side battling to sneak into the Europa League over the remainder of the season.

Holding off City will require a far brisker pace as Erling Haaland looks to accrue every scoring record known to man. While he has, one assumes, been safely stowed away in the Etihad Stadium’s bacta tank, the Gunners have lost their key man in the middle. Arsenal have not set a timescale for Gabriel Jesus’ recovery from knee surgery but fear it may not be March before they see him fit and fully firing. The Brazilian is not as necessary as an all-out goal scorer — Arteta’s side have ably shared out the goals and xG — but his movement and interplay brings out the best of Gabriel Martinelli and Bukayo Saka. Eddie Nketiah may snaffle up more chances, but outside the penalty box he could be a pale imitation, for all the work he has put in to improve his hold up play.

Above Arteta, the Arsenal hierarchy do appreciate that a window has opened and although they will not risk shattering a carefully constructed, youthful squad, they are going to attempt to dive through that slim gap. It is at the very least debatable whether, as Emile Smith Rowe returns from injury and Fabio Vieira blossoms after a midseason preseason, a winger is what they need, particularly when Shakhtar Donetsk are ready to charge a high price for the one they want. However Mykhaylo Mudryk is their primary target and talks have already taken place in London over a possible move. Would his addition be enough to keep Arsenal just ahead of Pep Guardiola’s tank armada? Only time will tell.

2. Heavy legs post-World Cup

Whilst Jesus’ injury might have the most profound direct impact on the title race it is fair to say that other teams will have had their energy levels more depleted by the great jamboree in Qatar. No Premier League club had more players play more minutes at that tournament than Manchester City even if their sole onfield representative in the final week of the tournament was Julian Alvarez, who will wait in the wings behind Haaland.

Perhaps the team who bore the heaviest load will be Tottenham. Their club captain Hugo Lloris missed out to team mate Cristian Romero in the final whilst a day earlier Ivan Perisic had been celebrating what may well be his World Cup swansong with a third-place medal. Harry Kane and Richarlison both carried a heavy load for quarterfinalists and may have picked up injuries on the way through. In short, Antonio Conte will have his work cut out in the early weeks of the season.

He will not be alone. In recent memory it would have been unimaginable that several mid tier Premier League teams would be having to accept that their star players would be returning late because they had been transformative figures for World Cup finalists. But Aston Villa goalkeeper Emiliano Martinez deserves a break to bask in Argentine adulation, as does Alexis MacAllister, who Brighton’s CEO seemed to confirm would be missing for a while yet.

“We are still waiting to hear from the Argentina FA on what their plans are but it would be pretty mean as a club to deny him the chance to visit his homeland,” Paul Barber told BBC Radio Sussex earlier this week. “I saw the scenes in Buenos Aires overnight and to not experience that I think would be a huge missed opportunity. We hope to get him back as soon as we can but once he has had a chance to decompress and enjoy the moment, which is really important in any sporting occasion especially the World Cup final.”

3. The race for top four

Still you could hardly blame Robert De Zerbi for wanting MacAllister back yesterday. After all, Brighton are in a race for the top four as the season approaches its halfway mark. They are not the only surprising contenders and if there is a sense that the Seagulls might slip away you could not say the same about the team who currently occupy third. As mentioned above, there is a sizeable xG gap between Arsenal, Manchester City and the rest but there is also a not insignificant space between Newcastle and the next 17 teams. Eddie Howe’s team are a real contender for Champions League qualification and FiveThirtyEight’s assessment that they have a 42 percent chance of getting there (just about level with Manchester United but behind Liverpool) makes sense for any team that has Bruno Guimaraes in their ranks.

A serious scrap looms for third and fourth. Tottenham are in position now but there’s only so long that winning whilst looking underwhelming can be an unquestionably good thing. Liverpool have pedigree but a lot of ground to make up. Manchester United seem to have finally understood that football clubs need to make grown up decisions but you could not blame Erik ten Hag if the turmoil of ownership and life post-Cristiano Ronaldo has an impact. Chelsea have lost some of their defensive prowess that they displayed early on under Thomas Tuchel but have not substituted it for much attacking punch so far under Graham Potter.

Still all these teams have the star quality to possibly go on a run of half a dozen games in which they grasp a top four position for themselves. All that can be said with any relative certainty right now is that the margins between success and failure promise to be razor sharp this season.

4. Can new coaches shake things up at the bottom?

As had been assumed from the moment the World Cup’s place in the calendar was confirmed, the final weeks of the first section of the Premier League season proved to be prime sacking territory. If anything was surprising it was that so many clubs opted to stay the course. Aston Villa, Wolverhampton Wanderers and Southampton all made breaks with their previous incumbents with only the former getting a replacement in time to have a meaningful impact before the hiatus. Ultimately Julen Lopetegui and Nathan Jones will stand and fall based on what they have achieved in the last few weeks.

At Molineux Lopetegui needs to revive an attack that under Nuno Espirito Santo and Bruno Lage wasted away like Miss Havisham. Jones, meanwhile, needs to help Southampton break their habit for playing reasonably well and somehow conspiring to ship three or four goals. In both cases their best bet might merely be to hope that there are three teams worse than them. Everton tick a lot of the boxes needed for a new year collapse, where once Frank Lampard spread hope now he seems to be a source of acrimony for a team that have conceded the most non-penalty xG this season. If Jordan Pickford cannot work miracles then there is trouble brewing at Goodison Park.

Gary O’Neill won the permanent manager’s job at Bournemouth, now under new American owners, by tightening up a leaky defense but goals tend to be a crucial ingredient in teams staying up. So far this season the Cherries are putting up the same xG per 90 minutes as Haaland. That is not as good as it sounds. Meanwhile such are the whims of Nottingham Forest ownership that it seems eminently plausible Steve Cooper will have a new team to cobble together as the drop looms.

5. A busier January window

It may, at best, infrequently have a tangible impact on the success of the best teams in England but the January transfer window remains one of the great frenzied moments of the season. This one might actually deliver deals to match the hyperbole with clubs having had over a month to rationally analyze their squads, hit the phones and line up deals. Wolves are expected to be among the busiest in terms of numerical additions, CBS Sports understands Matheus Cunha is set to undergo a medical at Molineux before joining on loan from Atletico Madrid. That deal includes options that are likely to be triggered in the events that Lopetegui’s side avoid relegation.

Having lost Armando Broja, who Potter had trusted with the starting role in the final two matches before the break, for the season, could Chelsea make a more immediate addition to go alongside their expected signing of Christopher Nkunku in the summer? Jurgen Klopp has already acknowledged that Liverpool may have erred in not strengthening their midfield but he will know that the transformative signings for the long haul, the Jude Bellinghams of the world, are almost certainly unavailable at midseason.

Manchester United are better off without Ronaldo than with him but that doesn’t mean another striker wouldn’t help a team that would otherwise be reliant on Anthony Martial. Perhaps the most intriguing team of all in January might be Tottenham, who spent heavily in the summer but have a manager who will always demand more. Could a failure to add creativity in midfield and a top tier right wing back drive a wedge between Spurs and Conte? We shall soon find out.