Matchday 1 of the 2025-26 EPL season is in the books, and we’re here to review it, identify the big takeaways, and examine the markets.
EPL Wrap
Manchester United and Arsenal started the 2025-26 EPL season with things looking a lot like the last as a Gunners set piece proved the difference.
Meanwhile, Sunderland stunned West Ham to win 3-0 and buck the trend of newly promoted teams on Matchday 1. The Stadium of Light lit up after an eight-year absence from the top flight. At the other end of the spectrum, Liverpool made relatively light work of Bournemouth to win 4-2. While Arne Slot is off to a winning start, they have a few issues to sort out defensively if they’re defend their title as $3 favourites.
Nottingham Forest aren’t surprising anybody this season. They played with 55% of the ball and Chris Wood again found the net on their way to a 3-1 win over Brentford. There were no goals as Chelsea took on Crystal Palace. Although, like the opener last season, Eberechi Ezi had a goal wiped off in what could be his last appearance for the club.
“Tottenham are edging closer to signing Eberechi Eze”
“Tottenham are advancing in the deal to sign Eberechi Eze”
Tottenham are confident they can strike a deal for Eberechi Eze”
“Tottenham in pole position to acquire Eberechi Eze”
SAME. STORY. EVERY. HOUR.
— Hotspur Edition (@HotspurEdition) August 18, 2025
While Aston Villa and Newcastle also went without a goal, Villa played much of it with only 10 men. Elsewhere, Tijjani Reijnders led Manchester City to a 4-0 win over Wolves in his debut for the club as Pep Guardiola’s side impressed.
The Thomas Frank era at Tottenham kicked off with a 3-0 win over Burnley. Richarlison, in particular, dominated for his two goals while the youthful midfield partnership of Lucas Bergvall and Archie Gray played above their age.
Brighton & Hove Albion will take some time to make up for the loss of Joao Pedro as they finished level 1-1 with Fulham. Lastly, a late Lukas Nmecha penalty capped off an impressive 1-0 win for Leeds over a worryingly bad Everton.
3 Takeaways From Matchday 1
United Still Can’t Handle In-swingers…
…and Arsenal might still be heavily reliant on set pieces to score.
Neither Manchester United nor Arsenal covered themselves in glory to start the 2025-26 EPL season.
The Gunners claimed the 1-0 win thanks to an early goal, but it all looked too familiar for both teams in the end.
Arsenal needed to score from a corner – a trend that makes it 31 EPL goals scored from corners since the start of 2023-24. Likewise, another United goal keeper couldn’t handle an in-swinger.
Mikel Arteta will take the win, regardless. His side gave up too many points to make a genuine push for the title last season. To take three here without playing well is an improvement on the last campaign. As a result, Arsenal have now gone 22 games unbeaten against the EPL’s ‘Big Six’.
In contrast, Ruben Amorim has now lost 15 of his 28 league matches since taking over at Manchester United. He’s the fastest manager in the last 16 years to suffer as many defeats without taking charge of a newly promoted team.
Amorim remains confident:
“We have players to win any game in the Premier League.”
Just not the one they’ve played so far this season…
Fulham is next for the Red Devils as $2.20 favourites. It doesn’t matter how they win on Matchday 2, Amorim just needs the three points.
City Surge
Manchester City didn’t look like themselves last season to be $4 to win the title before Matchday 1, but their 4-0 win over Wolves has seen them shorten into $3.75 already.
Tijjani Reijnders acted as the highlight as he chipped a perfect ball through to Rico Lewis to setup the opener. By the end of the game, Reijnders had scored one himself and laid on an assist to cap of an excellent debut for the club.
A goal, an assist, and a classy debut performance from Tijjani Reijnders 🩵@Microsoft | @ManCity pic.twitter.com/x9yHHF5G9O
— Premier League (@premierleague) August 16, 2025
Reijnders captures the urgency in possession City played with, which is in contrast to a lot of their play last season. Rayan Cherki did similar to also end up on the score sheet, becoming the second-youngest player to net for City on their EPL debut, at 21 years and 364 days old.
City haven’t rated a huge mention as title challengers. The popular prediction seems to be that they will fall further than last season, one in which could be Pep Guardiola’s last. Still, their $3.75 is worth diving into after Matchday 1.
Sunderlands Start The EPL Relegation Race In Front
Across the last 10 EPL seasons, promoted clubs have won only five of their 30 opening matches with Sunderland becoming the latest to start 2025-26 with a 3-0 win over West Ham. Three of those teams (Brentford, AFC Bournemouth and Huddersfield Town) managed to stay up, but Sunderland are $1.62 to be relegated.
Their three goal scorers all playing a pivotal role in their promotion will offer a lot of hope for Sunderland avoiding the drop. Eliezer Mayenda, Dan Ballard and Wilson Isidor made the most of their opportunities to started the new season with a bang.
𝐒𝐮𝐧𝐝𝐞𝐫𝐥𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝟑-𝟎 𝐖𝐞𝐬𝐭 𝐇𝐚𝐦
Black Cats back with a bang. This was Sunderland's…
-first Premier League win since May 2017
-first PL win by 3+ goals since Feb 2017 pic.twitter.com/GfqIJS0dED— Opta Analyst (@OptaAnalyst) August 16, 2025
Sunderland were solid defensively overall while Granit Xhaka offered plenty through the middle of the field. With Burnley to come on Matchday 2 as $3.10 underdogs, the Saints have an excellent chance to make significant strides to staying up.
West Ham, on the other hand, should be worried.
They played with 63% possession but managed only 0.56 expected goals and went the whole match without creating a big chance.
Graham Potter came into the EPL season under pressure to push the Hammers in the right direction, but the opener couldn’t have gone much worse. Gifted an early fixture against a recently promoted side, West Ham have let points slip already and should be considered to go down at $4.