The Recap: Gameweek 2

Arteta and Arsenal have their revenge at last. It's fair to say that Arsenal lost the league to Villa last season. Last season Arsenal overcame just about every obstacle they faced against Villa. Losing to them once stung, but losing to them twice with the second loss coming in the middle of a title-winning run of fixtures was maddening.

But now, the North London club has their revenge, a 2-0 win over their foes to continue a charmed start to the new Premier League season. And the win had to be charmed as well because Villa were the better side for much of the contest. Morgan Rogers was the game's standout player, and had Ollie Watkins been in even slightly better form it might have ended up being a 2-0 loss for Arsenal.

Haaland grabbed a hattrick of goals to put him level with Wayne Rooney for the number of EPL hattricks. Haaland has now scored seven hat-tricks since joining City. The same number as Wayne Rooney and Ronaldo.

But, Haaland wasn't the only player in red hot form over the weekend. Noni Madueke also scored a hat-trick of goals as Chelsea put six goals past Wolves in a scintillating display of attacking firepower. And like Haaland he broke a record as well. He became the 23rd different player to score a hat-trick for Chelsea in the Premier League. The most of any club. Bit of a weird stat but I think it accurately mirrors the revolving door that Chelsea has been for players and managers for a while now.

Brighton's cool and measured dispatch of Everton last weekend surprised me very much. Their frantic, end-to-end, unpredictable game against United, did not surprise me so much. This is the Brighton I expected to see, at least at the beginning of the season while in a period of transition under new management.

But, they found a way to dispatch United as well. They needed to be patient, it took a João Pedro goal in the fifth minute of extra time to seal the game. But it's two wins in two for the seagulls under their new manager and they will head into the game against Arsenal next weekend with growing confidence.

The Slot era began officially on opening weekend with a cool 2-0 win. The Slot Anfield era began last weekend with another cool 2-0 win over Brentford. Diaz and Salah stung the Bees to secure all three points for Liverpool. Arne Slot is now the first Liverpool manager to win his first two games in charge of the club.

The biggest difference you can see from Klopp's era, albeit only two games in, is that Slot's Liverpool is indeed very cool on the ball. Gone are the quick, fast transitions that characterised Klopp's heavy metal football and often led to very chaotic games. This new Liverpool is much more cool and measured. They're in less of a hurry to vertically progress the ball and more willing to keep it and knock it side to side as they look for ways to exploit the opposition's press. Their 92% pass completion rate on Sunday is the highest on record since records began in 03-04. It's a very different Liverpool, but this new formula seems to be turning out just okay.

It seems that every season now, three teams come into the Premier League from the Championship, and everyone expects those three teams to get relegated due to the disparities in quality at the top. And so, we have three would-be relegation strugglers in Ipswich Town, Leicester City, and Southampton this season. Let's see how they're faring.

Ipswich Town got hammered predictably by Manchester City. But I don't think their first two games this season have told us much about them so far. They've lost to two of the best teams in the division, no surprises there. The real test for Keiran McKenna's side begins next week against Fulham.

And Fulham will be hoping to keep picking up steam against Ipswich, having beat another would-be struggler in Leicester City last weekend. This result would have come as a disappointment to Leicester after their brave display against Tottenham on opening weekend. But this is the Premier League, every game is different, and beating one team doesn't guarantee that you'll beat another team that's weaker on paper. Something for Steve Cooper and his boys to keep in mind as they play Aston Villa next.

Southampton may have had the worst start to their campaign of the three sides. Losing narrowly to Nottingham Forest over the weekend means that they have picked up no points over the first two games. But unlike Ipswich, they haven't played the two best teams in the division. They've played a so-so Newcastle, and a Nottingham Forest who could very well end up being relegation strugglers themselves. A point from either of those games would have been great for Saints morale.

Now they must head into their game against Brentford next weekend knowing that they need to salvage something or else their situation will start to look very bleak with only three games played.

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