Premier League 2021-22 MatchDay 1: Predictions, Team News, Beting Tips

Premier League Opening Day - Photo: Premier League

The 2021-22 Premier League season will get underway on August 14, with reigning champions Manchester City opening the defence of their title away at Tottenham.

Elsewhere in the first round of fixtures, Arsenal and European champions Chelsea will both take in London derby dates, with the former travelling to Premier League new boys Brentford and the latter hosting Crystal Palace.

Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and Manchester United will welcome old foes Leeds United to Old Trafford, while Liverpool take on Championship winners Norwich City at Carrow Road.

FA Cup winners Leicester City are set to face Wolves, managerless Everton have a clash with Southampton to prepare for, Burnley will face Brighton, Newcastle United have a date with West Ham and the final newly-promoted outfit Watford have a home game against Aston Villa.

The new campaign will follow the traditional format of running through to May 22 next year after the 2020-21 campaign had to be shortened to fit in more games amid the coronavirus pandemic.

A mouth-watering clash between Liverpool and Chelsea at Anfield is due to take place on August 28, with Pep Guardiola's City due to face Arsenal on the same weekend.

The first north London derby of the campaign is pencilled in for September 25 - a day which will also see City arrive at Stamford Bridge to battle Chelsea.

2019-20 champions Liverpool are scheduled to face City on October 2 in what could be a crucial clash in the title race, and Jurgen Klopp's side are to come up against another potential rival for the trophy in United on the 23rd of the month at Old Trafford.

The first Manchester derby of the season will take place at Old Trafford on November 6, with the Merseyside derby to follow at the end of the month and the Red Devils in action once more against Arsenal.

Boxing Day has thrown up some exciting clashes as Liverpool will play Leeds, City have Leicester to contend with and Tottenham face London rivals Crystal Palace.

New Year's Day, meanwhile, will see Chelsea take on the Reds and Arsenal welcome the defending champions to Emirates Stadium.

City have another date with Chelsea on January 15, and the second north London derby of 2021-22 will be undertaken on the same day.

The title race should start heating up when United host Spurs on March 12 before clashing with Liverpool the following weekend.

Liverpool and Everton will meet again on April 24, while Chelsea are due to travel to Old Trafford on May 15, with the final weekend of the campaign set to follow seven days later.

City will finish against Aston Villa, United have a trip to Palace pencilled in, Chelsea host Watford, Liverpool are up against Wolves and Tottenham are away at Norwich City when the season reaches its conclusion.

What are the dates for the new season?

Photo: SportsRush

The 2021-22 Premier League season will start on Saturday, August 14 — 34 days after the Euro 2020 final at Wembley.

The season’s curtain raiser will meanwhile take place with the Community Shield between Leicester City and Manchester City at Wembley on Saturday, August 7.

The season will end on May 22, 2022. As usual, all 10 games will kick off at the same time.

Premier League teams debated starting the season on August 7 at a recent shareholders’ meeting, only to decide against the idea given the final of the European Championship on July 11.

Premier League Crystal Palace vs Chelsea: Predictions, Team news and Betting tips

Photo: Getty Images

Thomas Tuchel will look to bounce back from his first defeat as Chelsea manager after West Brom boss Sam Allardyce masterminded a 5-2 win at the Bridge which, in turn, saw London rivals West Ham steal a march on them in the top four race, and they take on a Crystal Palace side currently hovering precariously in 12th.

The Blues were comprehensively put to the sword by the Baggies after Thiago Silva received a red card, with the relegation-threatened club abandoning their attacking inhibitions and running riot against a defence that, until that point, had proven exceptionally stubborn and resilient.

Tuchel managed to put that defeat to one side as Chelsea beat Porto 2-0 at the Ramon Sanchez Pizjuan in Seville on Wednesday night, scoring two important away goals for their Champions League quarter-final showdown, but attention must quickly turn to domestic matters for this all-London clash.

Palace, under the evergreen Roy Hodgson, look destined for another campaign of mid-table stability, neither in threat of relegation or challenging for Europe, but the seasoned tactician’s future remains up in air with his contract expiring this summer, so he will want to ensure his side finish the season as strong as possible.

There are no easy games in the Premier League as the old adage goes, and Palace can be one of the more frustrating and tricky opponents, able to cause concern with their tenacity and industry, so this could be a game for N’Golo Kante, an enforcer capable of fighting fire with fire in the centre of the pitch against Hodgson’s well-oiled and battle-hardened pros. The Frenchman has made the third-most tackles of any midfielder in the league this season (71), despite starting just 21 games, so he will be relishing the middle-third battle against the likes of Luka Milivojevic and Jairo Riedewald.

Scoreline prediction: Crystal Palace 0-2 Chelsea

Premier League Everton v Southampton: Predictions, Team news, betting tips

After their first win at Anfield in Premier League history, Everton have their eyes on the top four spots with just five points separating them and West Ham. The Toffees hold a game in hand over the Hammers who face league leaders Manchester City this weekend so Carlo Ancelotti’s side will be aiming to keep the pressure on the Londoners.

Southampton have lost their way in recent weeks with only one league win to their name this year. Ralph Hassenhutl’s side suffered a heavy 3-0 defeat to Leeds on Tuesday as the Saints slumped down into 14th-place in the league.

The future of Danny Ings is under question at the minute, but the striker has only netted twice this year following his excellent start to the season. The Saints will need the 28-year-old to find his shooting boots this weekend if they hope to cause an upset on Merseyside.

In comparison, Dominic Calvert-Lewin has shown signs of rediscovering his early-season form, but a hamstring injury disrupted that as he was forced to miss the defeats against Fulham and Manchester City. The England international is expected to start this weekend after coming on as a substitute in their memorable win at Anfield.

Scoreline prediction: Everton 3-1 Southampton

Premier League Leicester City v Wolverhampton: Predictions, Team news, Betting tips

Leicester have enjoyed another fine start to the campaign and having won five of their seven matches so far they find themselves in second place at this early stage, just one point below reigning champions and early pace-setters Liverpool.

A 4-0 thumping over Portuguese outfit Sporting Braga saw the Foxes extend their winning run to five consecutive games so confidence will be high ahead of the visit of Wolverhampton Wanderers this Sunday.

With no Europe to contend with this season themselves, Wolves have lofty ambitions for the Premier League themselves and as things stand they sit in sixth place, just two points short of Leicester’s tally of 15 after some particularly strong performances in the last few weeks.

Last weekend’s win over Crystal Palace extended Nuno Espirito Santo’s side’s unbeaten run to four games and another clean sheet means they’ve conceded just once in that four match run, so expect another hearty defensive display here.

Leicester have kept three clean sheets in their last five matches – and indeed they failed to find the net in three of the four games previous to that win whilst under 2.5 goals have been scored in each of Wolves’ last four Premier League matches.

Prior to their 2-0 win over Crystal Palace last time out, three consecutive Wolves matches had remained goalless at half-time and it’s worth noting that both meetings between these two teams ended goalless last term.

Scoreline prediction: Leicester 1-0 Wolves

Premier League Tottenham Hotspur v Manchester City: Predictions, Team news, Betting tips

Mason got off to a promising start in the dugout for Spurs in midweek, but facing Man City is a different test entirely, and particularly in the final of a competition which they have utterly dominated in recent years.

Even accounting for the fact that Guardiola has openly admitted that EFL Cup success is his lowest priority for the season, the difference in experience in the dugout, and of trophy-winning knowhow on the pitch, makes it difficult to look past a Man City win in this one.

Add to that the fact that Spurs could be without their star man Harry Kane and it makes their task even tougher. We expect Man City to end the afternoon hoisting the League Cup trophy aloft for the sixth time in the last eight seasons.

Man City have only won one of the last four meetings between these two sides, although that did come in the most recent one as Ilkay Gundogan scored twice in a 3-0 Premier League triumph at the Etihad Stadium in February.

This will be the first meeting between the two sides in a major final since the 1981 FA Cup final, which Spurs eventually won via a replay in a match made famous by Ricky Villa's timelessly stunning solo effort.

It will only be the fourth ever meeting in the League Cup, and Spurs boast a 100% record from the previous three, most recently winning 2-0 in the fifth round en route to lifting the trophy in 2007-08.

Premier League: Full List of 20 Clubs

Arsenal:

Arsenal Football Club is a professional football club based in Islington, London, England. Arsenal plays in the Premier League, the top flight of English football. The club has won 13 league titles (including one unbeaten title), a record 14 FA Cups, two League Cups, 16 FA Community Shields, the League Centenary Trophy, one European Cup Winners' Cup, and one Inter-Cities Fairs Cup.

Aston Villa:

Aston Villa Football Club is an English professional football club based in Aston, Birmingham. The club competes in the Premier League, the top tier of the English football league system. Villa are one of only five English clubs to have won the European Cup, in 1981–82. They have also won the Football League First Division seven times, the FA Cup seven times, the League Cup five times, and the European (UEFA) Super Cup once.

Brentford:

Brentford Football Club is a professional football club based in Brentford, West London, England. They currently compete in the Premier League, the highest tier of English football, having gained promotion via the playoffs at the end of the 2020–21 Championship season. Nicknamed "the Bees", the club was founded in 1889 and played home matches at Griffin Park from 1904 before moving to Brentford Community Stadium in 2020. Their main rivals are fellow West London clubs Fulham and Queens Park Rangers.

Burnley:

Burnley Football Club is an English association football club based in Burnley, Lancashire. Founded on 18 May 1882, it was one of the first to become professional (in 1883), and subsequently put pressure on the Football Association to permit payments to players. The club entered the FA Cup for the first time in 1885–86 and was one of the 12 founder members of the Football League in 1888–89. From the 1950s until the 1970s, under chairman Bob Lord, the club became renowned for its youth policy and scouting system, and was one of the first to set up a purpose-built training ground. The team currently compete in the Premier League, the top tier of English football.

Chelsea:

Chelsea Football Club is an English professional football club based in Fulham, West London. Founded in 1905, the club competes in the Premier League, the top division of English football. Chelsea are among England's most successful clubs, having won over thirty competitive honours, including six league titles and seven European trophies. Their home ground is Stamford Bridge.

Crystal Palace:

Crystal Palace Football Club is a professional football club based in Selhurst in the Borough of Croydon, South London, England, who currently compete in the Premier League, the highest level of English football. Although formally created as a professional outfit in 1905, the club's origins can be traced as far back as 1861, when an amateur Crystal Palace football team first played at the Crystal Palace Exhibition building, which has led to claims by the club that Crystal Palace should be recognised as the oldest professional football club in the world, after historians discovered a direct lineage through their ownership under the same Crystal Palace Company.

Everton:

Everton Football Club (/ˈɛvərtən/) is an English professional football club based in Liverpool that competes in the Premier League, the top tier of English football. The club is a founding member of the Football League and has competed in the top division for a record 118 seasons since the Football League's creation, having missed only four top-flight seasons (1930–31, 1951–52, 1952–53, 1953–54). Everton is the second-longest continuous serving club in English top flight football and has won nine league titles, five FA Cups, one European Cup Winners' Cup and nine Charity Shields.

Leeds:

Leeds United Football Club is an English professional football club based in the city of Leeds, West Yorkshire. The club was formed in 1919 following the disbanding of Leeds City by the Football League and took over their Elland Road stadium. The club currently competes in the Premier League, the top flight of English football, following promotion from the EFL Championship during the 2019—20 season.

Leicester City:

Leicester City Football Club is a professional football club based in Leicester in the East Midlands, England. The club competes in the Premier League, the top division of England's football league system, and plays its home matches at the King Power Stadium.

Liverpool:

Liverpool Football Club is a professional football club in Liverpool, England, that competes in the Premier League, the top tier of English football. Domestically, the club has won nineteen League titles, seven FA Cups, a record eight League Cups and fifteen FA Community Shields. In international competitions, the club has won six European Cups, more than any other English club, three UEFA Cups, four UEFA Super Cups (also English records) and one FIFA Club World Cup.

Man City:

Manchester City Football Club is an English football club based in Manchester that competes in the Premier League, the top flight of English football. Founded in 1880 as St. Mark's (West Gorton), it became Ardwick Association Football Club in 1887 and Manchester City in 1894. The club's home ground is the Etihad Stadium in east Manchester, to which it moved in 2003, having played at Maine Road since 1923. The club adopted their sky blue home shirts in 1894 in the first season of the club's current iteration, and have been used ever since.

Man Utd:

Manchester United Football Club is a professional football club based in Old Trafford, Greater Manchester, England, that competes in the Premier League, the top flight of English football. Nicknamed "the Red Devils", the club was founded as Newton Heath LYR Football Club in 1878, changed its name to Manchester United in 1902 and moved to its current stadium, Old Trafford, in 1910.

Newcastle United:

Newcastle United Football Club is an English professional football club based in Newcastle upon Tyne, that plays in the Premier League - the top flight of English football. The club was founded in 1892 by the merger of Newcastle East End and Newcastle West End. The team plays its home matches at St. James' Park. Per the Taylor Report's requirement that all Premier League clubs have an all-seater stadium, the ground was adjusted in the mid-1990s and currently has a capacity of 52,305.

Norwich City:

Norwich City Football Club (also known as The Canaries or The Yellows) is an English professional football club based in Norwich, Norfolk. As of the 2021-22 season, the team compete in the Premier League, the top tier of English football, after winning the 2020–21 EFL Championship title. The club was founded in 1902. Since 1935, Norwich have played their home games at Carrow Road and have a long-standing and fierce rivalry with East Anglian rivals Ipswich Town, with whom they have contested the East Anglian derby 134 times since 1902.

Southampton:

Southampton Football Club is an English professional football club based in Southampton, Hampshire, which plays in the Premier League, the top tier of English football. One of the founding members of the Premier League, they have spent the majority of their history in the top flight since their first promotion to it in 1966; their longest continuous period was for 27 seasons between 1978 and 2005.

Tottenham:

Tottenham Hotspur Football Club, commonly referred to as Tottenham or Spurs, is an English professional football club based in Tottenham, London, that competes in the Premier League, the top flight of English football. The team has played its home matches in the 62,850-capacity Tottenham Hotspur Stadium since April 2019, replacing their former home of White Hart Lane, which had been demolished to make way for the new stadium on the same site.

Watford:

Watford Football Club is an English professional football club based in Watford, Hertfordshire. They will play in the Premier League, the first tier of English football, in the 2021-22 season.

West Ham:

West Ham United Football Club is an English professional football club based in Stratford, East London that compete in the Premier League, the top tier of English football. The club plays at the London Stadium, having moved from their former home, the Boleyn Ground, in 2016.

Wolves:

Wolverhampton Wanderers Football Club, commonly known as Wolves, is a professional association football club based in the city of Wolverhampton in the West Midlands, England. Formed as St. Luke's F.C. in 1877, the club has played at Molineux Stadium since 1889 and has been competing in the Premier League, the top division of English football, since winning promotion in 2018. The 2020–21 season was the club's 66th season in total at the highest level and seventh since the foundation of the Premier League in 1992.

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