After the release of the 2025/26 Premier League fixtures, football writer Alex Keble looks at 10 things we have learned about the season ahead:
- Fascinating opening day has plenty of stories
- Amorim has challenging start at pivotal moment
- Man City favourites if they navigate tough first five
- Arsenal's hard start can hand Liverpool advantage
- Favourable run-ins for two title contenders
- Hectic festive period packed with exciting games
- MW5 will be huge, reverse fixtures in MW33 season-defining
- Things come to head for Frank's Spurs in November and December
- Sunderland have promoted clubs' best start
- Palace most likely to "do a Forest" this season
Fascinating opening day has plenty of stories
The opening weekend never disappoints. The new season kicks off on Friday night with Liverpool beginning their title defence against a side they beat 9-0 in August three years ago.
In Saturday's lunchtime kick-off, two UEFA Champions League contenders face off at Villa Park, with Newcastle United facing Aston Villa on the opening weekend for the second time in three years, having beaten Villa 5-1 at St. James' Park in 2023/24.
Then there’s Thomas Frank’s Tottenham Hotspur navigating a major tactical shift against defensively-robust Burnley, who conceded just 16 goals in the Championship.
The day finishes with Manchester City’s huge summer rebuild facing a thorny test at Wolverhampton Wanderers, and on Sunday the headline game is Manchester United hosting Arsenal at the beginning of a monumental season for both clubs.
It’s wall-to-wall drama.
Amorim has challenging start at pivotal moment
Ruben Amorim knows as well as anyone that a strong start is essential if he is to live up to the promise he made on the Old Trafford pitch that “the good days are coming.”
Man Utd fans will be gutted to see they have the most difficult start in the entire division, according to Opta:
Click here to zoom in on image.
The Man Utd reboot this summer simply demands instant results, otherwise the danger of another disastrous cycle will loom into view.
But Amorim’s side has a remarkably tough first five fixtures, playing three of the "Big Six" – and all five by Matchweek 11.
Man Utd's first five fixtures
Par for those five games is about seven points, yet that wouldn’t exactly fill supporters with confidence, not with Brentford, Sunderland, Liverpool, Brighton & Hove Albion, Nottingham Forest, and Spurs after that.
Man Utd will need to hit the ground running; will need to play at their very peak to avoid a start not dissimilar to the 11 points accrued from the opening nine games under Erik ten Hag last season.
Man City favourites if they navigate tough first five
Pep Guardiola is also in the middle of a crucial summer and his team also have a difficult start that could scupper their hopes of bedding in new signings quickly.
Having already signed Tijjani Reijnders, Rayan Ait-Nouri, and Rayan Cherki, Guardiola is clearly looking to make significant tactical changes as he attempts to make Man City into a more vertical and transitional side.
Those changes mean he would have preferred a tamer start than their first five fixtures: not a single banker among them.
Man City's first five fixtures
But if Guardiola successfully navigates this period he will feel confident, because Man City have long strings of easier games through autumn and spring, most notably enjoying a more favourable five-game run to the end of the season.
Man City's last five fixtures
Traditionally Guardiola teams end strong. So, if their new signings settle in, and indeed if Spurs and Man Utd both struggle with their own transitional periods in those early Etihad games, then Man City might just emerge as title favourites.
Arsenal's hard start can hand Liverpool advantage
More likely, Liverpool will move out in front, such is the difficulty of these early games for Man City – and for Arsenal.
Who knows what the summer will bring, but it’s fair nobody will accept any excuses if Mikel Arteta’s side don’t challenge for the Premier League title all the way through until May.
They will need to start in elite form, because their opening six fixtures look very, very tough.
Arsenal's first six fixtures
That trip to Anfield on 30 August stands out. If Liverpool win that, then with Man City and Arsenal both likely to drop early points, Arne Slot’s side can pick up where they left off and race into an early lead.
Liverpool's first six matches are a lot kinder than their rivals.
Liverpool's first six fixtures
We know from 2024/25 that Liverpool are hard to knock off the top once they’ve got a buffer in first. It will take a lot for Man City or Arsenal to deny them that this year.
Favourable run-ins for two title contenders
Liverpool have an easier start than Man City or Arsenal, but their roles reverse when we look at April and May.
From March onwards, the Gunners’ final 10 Premier League games contain just two of last season’s top seven (and neither of Spurs or Man Utd), with Man City (A) and Newcastle (H) in late April.
It’s exactly the same situation for Man City in their final ten, with only Chelsea (A) and Arsenal (H) in April disrupting an otherwise straightforward set of games.
By contrast Liverpool’s May reads: Man Utd (A), Chelsea (H), Villa (A), and Brentford (H). Maybe, then, the final couple of months will see someone surge.
Could it be Chelsea? If they have an outside chance of winning the title we will know by early October, after they play Man Utd (A), Brighton (H), and Liverpool (H) in successive games.
But even if they last the distance, their run-in is even worse than Liverpool’s. Six of their final 10 games are against clubs who finished in the top eight last season, plus they also face Spurs and Man Utd in that sequence.
Hectic festive period packed with exciting games
As usual, Christmas is a very busy time in the Premier League, with four full rounds of matches played between 27 December and 7 January. That’s 40 matches in 11 days, covering two weekend rounds and two midweek rounds.
It can be easy to lose track of all the action, but this year there are too many headline games for that.
On 27 December, we have Man Utd v Newcastle, Forest v Man City, Chelsea v Aston Villa, and Arsenal v Brighton.
That’s an unprecedented number of big games, and it doesn’t relent. Over the following 10 days we have Arsenal v Aston Villa, Man City v Chelsea, Leeds United v Man Utd, Fulham v Chelsea, and Arsenal v Liverpool.
It’s hard to say, this far ahead of time, who has the hardest festive period – but it’s unlikely anyone can beat Villa’s run.
Unai Emery’s side travel to Chelsea and Arsenal, then host Forest, and finally visit Selhurst Park to play their bogey team Crystal Palace.
MW5 will be huge, reverse fixtures in MW33 season-defining
If there’s one weekend that stands out above all the others, it’s the weekend of 20 September, Matchweek 5.
All four of the clubs with reasonable hopes of challenging for the Premier League title have huge games that weekend: Chelsea travel to Man Utd, Liverpool host Everton, while Arsenal and Man City meet at Emirates Stadium.
Coming so early in the campaign, it will for the most part feel like an early test of mettle. But when the round is reversed on 18 April – on Matchweek 33 – it could be decisive.
Liverpool’s first game at Everton’s new stadium makes that one particularly tough. It could be a blessing or a curse that it comes on the same weekend as Man City’s head-to-head with Arsenal.
If we have a three- or even four-horse race, 18 April will be the date to keep an eye on.
Things come to head for Frank's Spurs in November and December
Undoubtedly one of the most intriguing teams of the new Premier League season will be Frank’s Spurs.
They have a pretty kind opening set of games, aside from hosting Man City on Matchweek 2, raising hopes Frank can get the new style bedded in.
But things suddenly take a turn in November, which is when the Frank era could come under some strain.
They play Chelsea (H), Man Utd (H), and Arsenal (A) in consecutive league games in November, before facing Newcastle (A), Liverpool (H), and Frank’s old club Brentford both home and away in December.
Nobody will envy what Spurs must navigate as the evenings draw in.
Sunderland have promoted clubs' best start
After two consecutive seasons in which the promoted clubs have all gone straight back down, the focus is on whether any of Sunderland, Burnley, or Leeds can get early points on the board.
Sunderland have the best chance. If the atmosphere at the Stadium of Light proves intimidating, then they can get a couple of wins at least from West Ham United (H), Burnley (A), and Brentford (H) in their first three.
Burnley might have that six-pointer with the Black Cats, but it’s sandwiched between Spurs (A) and Man Utd (A). Meanwhile Leeds open with Everton (H), Arsenal (A), and Newcastle (H).
Of the three, only Sunderland fans will be feeling optimistic about how results will go in August.
Palace most likely to "do a Forest" this season
Forest’s success last season has raised the hopes of every supporter of a mid-table Premier League club.
The most likely to put together a string of early results is Palace, partly because they ended 2024/25 so well under Oliver Glasner and will be buoyed by their FA Cup triumph, and partly because the fixture list is in their favour.
Palace's first five fixtures
According to Opta’s calculations, they have the joint-easiest set of opening five games.
If they average around two points per game from their first five matches, then Palace fans might start believing last year’s heroics weren’t just a one-off.