BIG 5 European Leagues Weekend Preview: Newcastle visit Man City

By the end of this coming weekend, we’ll have seen action from all of Europe’s BIG 5 leagues. Here’s a recap of what’s happened so far in England, France and Spain, as well as a look ahead to the most relevant matches, trends and talking points on the horizon.

Goals-per-game average trends: 2022/23 recap

The Bundesliga was the most free-flowing of the BIG 5 leagues in the 2022/23 campaign, while LaLiga produced the lowest average at 2.51 goals per game. Ligue 1 has started delivering a higher goals per game average, season on season, something we’ll touch on again shortly.

Bundesliga - 3.17

Premier League - 2.85

Ligue 1 - 2.81

Serie A - 2.57

LaLiga - 2.51

Stats via footystats. Let’s get back into the current season for now.

English Premier League

VAR issues rear their head again

What would a weekend in the Premier League be without some VAR controversy? Man Utd claimed a slender 1-0 win over Wolves in the final match of round 1, but the real talking point was the failure of officials to give the visitors a late penalty. The PGMOL issued an apology, and that entire team of officials weren’t selected for this coming weekend’s matches.

Nottingham Forest vs Sheffield United under the Friday night lights

Forest’s home form was a critical factor in their survival in the top-flight last season. They claimed a staggering 30 of their 38 points (79%) at the City Ground. The Blades didn’t get the start they wanted with a home defeat to Crystal Palace, and this will be another huge test. Forest claimed exactly a point per game in 2022/23, but they’ll be targeting all 3 on Friday.

Tottenham, starting life after Harry Kane with a 2-2 draw at Brentford, meet Man Utd on Saturday in arguably the outstanding game of the weekend. Right after that match, there’s the enticing prospect of Man City vs Newcastle; the impressive Magpies hit Aston Villa for 5 in their opener, with debutants Sandro Tonali and Harvey Barnes getting on the scoresheet.

City skipper Kevin De Bruyne limped off in their 3-0 win at Burnley, with rumours now suggesting he needs surgery on a hamstring problem and could be out until 2024.

2 capital clashes to savour

Sunday provides new-look Chelsea with an opportunity to strut their stuff in a London Derby away to West Ham. The Hammers have sold Declan Rice and are in talks with Man City over the sale of Lucas Paquetá, so they’re seemingly entering a period of transition, not unlike their opponents, who have just snapped up Moisés Caicedo for €116m. The Blues drew 1-1 with Liverpool last Sunday, stretching their sequence of stalemates with the Reds to 7 matches.

Arsenal round out the game week with a Monday night visit to Crystal Palace, who themselves are dealing with the loss of key players. Wilf Zaha has departed for Galatasaray and Michael Olise is a serious target for Chelsea.

Ligue 1

Goals on the menu again?

32 goals in 9 matches made for a massive average of 3.56 goals per game in the opening weekend of France’s top-flight. The season average for 2022/23 was 2.81, making it the third most free-scoring of the BIG 5 leagues last term.  The equivalent figures for the preceding 3 seasons were 2.81, 2.76 and 2.52. There’s a clear upturn in goalmouth activity in France.

Amazingly, the only match that ended goalless on MD1 involved PSG, a 0-0 stalemate at home to Lorient. Their line-up featured new signings Lucas Hernández, Milan Škriniar, Manuel Ugarte, Gonçalo Ramos, Marco Asensio and Lee Kang-in. Without Neymar (recently departed for Al Hilal) and Lionel Messi, and with ongoing doubts over Kylian Mbappé’s long-term future, Luis Enrique’s new-look PSG will take a lot of getting used to. They visit Toulouse on Saturday night.

LaLiga

Champions Barcelona began the defence of their title with an underwhelming 0-0 draw at Getafe. They next face Cádiz on Sunday, a team who have actually kept clean sheets in 2 of the last 4 H2Hs in LaLiga, so Xavi’s men might need to grind this match out. They’ll also be minus Raphinha through suspension.

Also on Sunday, Real Betis meet Atlético Madrid, with both sides claiming impressive wins with goals at both ends on the opening weekend. If you didn’t see it, Memphis Depay scored a screamer for Atléti against Granada from outside the box.

The opening round in LaLiga produced a total of 21 goals in 10 matches, well below last season’s average of 2.51 GPG.

Serie A

Italy’s Serie A kicks off on Saturday, a day on which last season’s Champions League runners-up Inter meet the impressive and ever-improving Monza at San Siro. Monza were fancied for relegation last term but finished in 11th, and took 4 points off the Nerazzurri.

Champions Napoli travel to newly-promoted Frosinone earlier that evening. 4 different teams have won the Scudetto in the last 4 Italian top-flight seasons, and Napoli are bidding to become the first side to successfully defend the crown since Juventus in 2020. However, their prospects aren’t helped by losing coach Luciano Spalletti and star centre-back Kim Min-jae.

Speaking of Juve, they’re away to Udinese on Sunday night, a H2H which has seen 1 side fail to score in each of the last 3 meetings.

Bundesliga

Harry Kane’s Bayern Munich debut didn’t go according to plan, as they lost 3-0 to RB Leipzig in the DFL-Supercup. He’ll be pushing for a first start as the Bavarian giants get their Bundesliga campaign up and running against Werder Bremen on Friday. They’re looking for a 12th consecutive title, and are on a staggering unbeaten run of 31 matches against these opponents.

Dortmund welcome Köln to Signal Iduna Park on Saturday. Last season’s 2 meetings between these sides in the Bundesliga produced a total of 12 goals.

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