The Premier League’s fourth gameweek did not so much unfold as detonate: red cards, centre-forwards throwing their weight around, a 34-year-old defender scoring from another postcode, and a promoted side marching into Stamford Bridge without a hint of fear. Strip away the league table, ignore the points. On performance alone, this was a weekend that rearranged reputations.
Below is how the 20 teams stacked up on what they actually produced on the pitch.
1. Leeds United (last week: 3rd)
Leeds United 4-1 Newcastle United
Elland Road has seen nights like this before. Raw, raucous, unforgiving. Leeds played like a team offended by the idea of being second best.
Daniel Farke’s side ripped into Newcastle from the first whistle. The first half was a siege. Jayden Bogle seemed to occupy three positions at once, careering forward, blocking shots, then — almost by accident — adding his name to the scoresheet when Dominic Calvert-Lewin’s header cannoned in off him.
Calvert-Lewin was monstrous. He bullied Sven Botman and Malick Thiaw, winning every duel that mattered, scoring one, setting up another, and imposing himself in a way Newcastle never solved. Noah Okafor floated in from the left, knitting attacks together and getting his goal too.
Behind them, the midfield three of Anton Stach, Ethan Ampadu and Ao Tanaka simply ran over Newcastle. Every loose ball, every second contact, every 50-50 — Leeds owned them. Newcastle’s late consolation barely dented the mood. Farke called it “top-class”. It was.
2. Brighton (last week: 17th)
Coventry City 0-5 Brighton
Two words. Lewis Dunk.
Brighton’s captain, 34 years old and supposedly old enough to know better, ambled onto a loose ball from 30 yards and stroked it into the top corner as if he were passing five yards in training. Goal-of-the-season talk in September is usually nonsense. Not this time.
What made the demolition of Coventry more striking was who Brighton were missing. No Yankuba Minteh, no Kaoru Mitoma, barely a sighting of Georginio Rutter all season, and yet Fabian Hurzeler’s side are scoring at will. More than three a game in the league. Without their headline acts.
Malick Yalcouye punished soft defending with the composure of a seasoned No 10. Charalampos Kostoulas juggled the ball as if on a futsal court before finishing. Dunk added that outrageous strike. Pascal Gross and Yasin Ayari, the other scorers, ran midfield with a neat blend of intelligence and timing.
Brighton were a step quicker in every phase. Coventry never caught up.
3. Nottingham Forest (last week: 13th)
Aston Villa 1-2 Nottingham Forest
Oliver Glasner called the second-half performance “amazing to watch”. It was also ruthless.
Forest came out after the break as if they’d been plugged into the mains. Liam Delap, already the best player on the pitch, needed less than a minute to underline it, thrashing in from distance. He then hit the side-netting and saw another ruled out. Villa never worked him out.
In midfield, Xaver Schlager and James McAtee dictated tempo. Schlager pinged diagonals with ease and almost scored with a header from Daniel Munoz’s cross. Munoz himself tore into Villa’s left flank, and once Ian Maatsen limped off, that side turned into a motorway. Forest’s winner duly came from that channel, with Morgan Gibbs-White adding the deft flick that unlocked the box.
Villa finished with 10 men and fewer ideas. Forest finished with the points and a performance that felt like a statement.
4. Manchester City (last week: 7th)
Manchester United 0-1 Manchester City
Forget the VAR circus. Look at what Manchester City did with 10 men at Old Trafford.
Phil Foden’s petulant kick at Bruno Fernandes after 23 minutes should have flipped the derby on its head. Instead, Enzo Maresca calmly re-engineered the game. He sacrificed Rayan Cherki at half-time — City’s most creative spark — and sent on Iliman Ndiaye, a runner, a carrier, a worker.
Ndiaye turned the match into a personal showcase. Erling Haaland compared him to Neymar afterwards. It was not entirely wild. Every time United thought they could break, Ndiaye or Elliot Anderson snapped back at them, City dropping into a compact shape that denied Marcus Rashford and company the spaces they crave.
United never truly laid a glove on them. City waited, controlled, and pounced. One goal, one red card, and a lesson in how a smart team turns a crisis into an advantage.
5. Arsenal (last week: 1st)
Sunderland 0-2 Arsenal
Champions don’t always dazzle. Sometimes they just dig.
At Sunderland, Arsenal had to scrap. The free-flowing demolition of Chelsea a week earlier felt a long way away in a tight, snarling contest on Wearside. Sunderland pressed, harried, and leaned hard on Brian Brobbey’s physical presence. Arsenal met it head on.
David Raya, arguably the league’s standout goalkeeper, changed the mood with one moment: a penalty save from Enzo Le Fee that sucked the air out of the stadium and injected it straight into Arsenal. Within minutes, Bruno Guimaraes stepped off the bench and lashed in a spectacular long-range strike. Sunderland’s belief wobbled. Arsenal’s hardened.
Christos Tzolis, roughed up at Villa Park previously, responded by chasing lost causes and sliding into tackles from one end of the pitch to the other. This was not pretty. It was not meant to be. It was the kind of win that keeps titles on track.
6. Hull City (last week: 16th)
Chelsea 2-2 Hull City
Hull arrived at Stamford Bridge as supposed relegation fodder. They left having made a mockery of that label again.
Sergej Jakirovic’s side did not come to cling on. Late on, with the score level, they were the ones trying to win it. Mohamed-Ali Cho almost did, miscuing a fine Ryan Giles cross that deserved better.
Hull’s organisation without the ball is clear now: a narrow 5-4-1, low block, compact. But this is not a team that only defends. Mohamed Belloumi, all subtle touches and smart angles, scored twice and tormented Chelsea’s back line. When Hull broke, they did it with purpose.
Eight points from four games gives them the third-best start of any promoted side in Premier League history. The numbers are startling. The work rate is not. Regan Slater nicking the ball off Valentin Barco in the 92nd minute summed them up. They run, they scrap, they refuse to bow to the script.
7. Fulham (last week: 20th)
Liverpool 0-0 Fulham
Alvaro Arbeloa demanded more. His players delivered.
After a punishing start to the season and heavy criticism, a point at Anfield felt like more than a draw. It felt like a reset. Fulham were disciplined, organised and, crucially, calm.
David Affengruber, making his Premier League debut at centre-back, slotted in alongside a back line that barely allowed Liverpool a clear sight of goal. Ahead of him, Alex Iwobi drifted infield from the left into what Arbeloa called the “inside winger in the pocket” role, linking neatly with Antonee Robinson and causing constant problems.
Josh King ran channels, spun defenders, sat Dominik Szoboszlai down with a sharp chop and generally played like a forward a level above relegation battles. Only Jeremy Jacquet’s goal-line clearance from Gonzalo Garcia denied Fulham the win their structure and bravery might have merited.
No goals, yes. But plenty of encouragement.
8. Bournemouth (last week: 5th)
Bournemouth 2-2 Brentford
Bournemouth keep playing well and keep walking away annoyed.
Marco Rose liked what he saw in attack. He had every reason to. One sweeping move in the final quarter of an hour — Ryan Christie to Alex Scott to Tyler Adams to Marcus Tavernier, then on to Rayan — carved Brentford apart. The finish was weak. That, right now, is Bournemouth’s problem in a nutshell.
Evanilson’s hold-up play and relentless running in behind stretched Brentford all afternoon, with Antonio Silva repeatedly picking him out from deep. Scott was excellent between the lines, everything bar the final touch. Rayan and Silva also passed up big chances.
At the other end, individual errors kept dragging Bournemouth back. For the fourth game running, they failed to protect a lead. The football is sharp, brave and easy on the eye. The details — the concentration, the finishing — are not.
9. Ipswich Town (last week: 19th)
Crystal Palace 2-3 Ipswich Town
Ipswich’s win at Selhurst Park was chaotic, flawed and compelling — just like the game itself.
Gary O’Neil insisted his side deserved the points. The numbers back him up: more shots, more on target, more touches in the box, an xG at least double Palace’s. Yet with Axel Disasi sent off before the break, Ipswich somehow spent a long stretch of the second half pinned back, clinging on, and living dangerously when Anan Khalaili somehow failed to convert at the back post.
O’Neil could still point to missed chances of his own team’s making right after half-time. The difference was Leif Davis. The left-back was everywhere. He bent in a delicious cross for the opener, then scored the second himself, then rose again to head against the bar, indirectly creating the third.
Three decisive involvements from a full-back. Ipswich’s season might yet revolve around him.
10. Sunderland (last week: 2nd)
Sunderland 0-2 Arsenal
If you want a masterclass in playing with your back to goal, start the tape and watch Brian Brobbey.
By the 94th minute, Nordi Mukiele zipped a pass into Brobbey’s feet. For the ninth time, he pinned Ezri Konsa, shielded the ball, and rolled it to a team-mate. Old-fashioned note-taking rather than data feeds the tally, but the impression was clear: Brobbey was a handful Arsenal could not fully contain.
Sunderland leaned into his strengths. Long balls, quick transitions, bodies flying into challenges. Within two minutes, Granit Xhaka had robbed Myles Lewis-Skelly and Brobbey had already flattened Konsa. Arsenal got the message early.
The game hinged on two moments. Enzo Le Fee’s penalty, saved by Raya. Bruno Guimaraes’ thunderbolt moments later. Sunderland kept coming, but the momentum had gone. The performance, though, said plenty about their intent at this level.
11. Chelsea (last week: 8th)
Chelsea 2-2 Hull City
Chelsea score. Chelsea concede. Rinse. Repeat.
Twenty league games without a clean sheet tell their own story. Against Hull, the pattern was painfully familiar. Cole Palmer, Joao Pedro and Morgan Rogers combined beautifully for an early opener that screamed quality. Then the Keystone Cops took over at the back.
“Don’t let the ball bounce” is defending 101. Chelsea let it bounce twice before Hull’s equaliser. Malo Gusto, Jorrel Hato and Wesley Fofana all played their part in the mess. Xabi Alonso called his side “soft” and admitted they were punished. He was being kind.
Without Moises Caicedo, the midfield looks hollow, especially in transition. The back line is exposed again and again. Yet Chelsea remain wildly entertaining. In the final minutes, Alonso had Palmer, Rogers, Joao Pedro, Estevao and Danny Welbeck all on the pitch hunting a winner. At the other end, Hull were still pressing high, Valentin Barco getting robbed deep in his own half.
Chaos, for now, is Chelsea’s brand.
12. Everton (last week: 9th)
Tottenham Hotspur 0-0 Everton
David Moyes walked away from north London with a question: point gained or chance wasted?
Spurs started fast. For 15 minutes they threatened to blow Everton away. Then they faded. Jordan Pickford barely had to make a serious save until Matheus Fernandes’ tame effort after the interval, and his only real test — late on, after his own poor pass — was one he passed.
Everton’s defensive shape held. Jarrad Branthwaite threw himself in front of shots, twice standing tall to deny Fernandes and Sandro Tonali. James Garner snapped into tackles in front of him and then tried to push his team on, linking with Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall to create Brennan Johnson’s best chance.
Dewsbury-Hall might have scored himself had Antonin Kinsky not picked the worst moment for “the most dangerous pass in football”, mirroring Alisson’s misjudgement for Liverpool against Fulham. Everton were solid, structured… and just a little too cautious. Against a Spurs side so low on belief, they may look back on this as two points dropped.
13. Tottenham Hotspur (last week: 14th)
Tottenham Hotspur 0-0 Everton
The pattern is becoming painful.
For a quarter of an hour, Spurs buzzed. The ball zipped, the movement was sharp, the crowd stirred. Yet even at their liveliest, they never truly looked like scoring. The defining moment came early: Savio slipped in Matheus Fernandes, who only needed to shoot. He rolled his foot over the ball instead. The chance vanished.
From there, the fear took over. Passes went sideways, then backwards. In the 38th minute, Micky van de Ven stole possession in the centre circle. Sandro Tonali passed six yards to Fernandes. Fernandes went back to Tonali. Tonali shuffled it to Rodrigo Bentancur, who returned it. A pointless square dance, greeted with groans.
Late on, Mohammed Kudus and Lucas Bergvall repeated the trick, a bounce pass to nowhere that exasperated Roberto De Zerbi on the touchline. Two shots on target all game. One greeted with ironic cheers by their own fans. Confidence has drained out of this team. The football shows it.
14. Brentford (last week: 18th)
Bournemouth 2-2 Brentford
This was not the Brentford that tore through Spurs or dominated Leeds for 45 minutes. This was a side hanging on and grateful for the point.
Kevin Schade scored twice and admitted afterwards they were “lucky” to escape with a draw. He was right. Those two goals were Brentford’s only shots on target. One arrived as a gift from Bournemouth goalkeeper Djordje Petrovic, whose errant pass set Schade up.
Brentford never found a rhythm. Their pressing was half a yard off, their build-up slow. Mamadou Sangare, so impressive in the first two games, flickered only briefly, involved in the move for the opener but short of his early-season levels.
More troubling is Igor Thiago’s form. Still without a Premier League goal, he offered little threat here. At the moment, Brentford’s attack begins and ends with Schade. That is not a sustainable plan.
15. Liverpool (last week: 4th)
Liverpool 0-0 Fulham
Anfield waited for a spark that never came.
Andoni Iraola knew this was the type of match that sometimes needs a set piece or a flash of genius to break open. Liverpool had chances from dead balls — Victor Munoz’s header, clawed away by Bernd Leno, and a late half-sight for Alexander Isak — but the moment of brilliance simply never arrived.
Bradley Barcola looked short of rhythm. Florian Wirtz never got going, his one notable contribution a neat flick to release Barcola in the second half. The winger’s cutback failed to find Isak. That sequence captured the afternoon perfectly: promising positions, blunt endings.
After back-to-back wins over Ipswich and Atletico Madrid, Liverpool looked flat and short of ideas. Fulham were organised but hardly ferocious. Even so, Liverpool could not find the energy or quality to unpick them. Home draws like this linger.
16. Aston Villa (last week: 15th)
Aston Villa 1-2 Nottingham Forest
Unai Emery did not sugarcoat it. “How we played today, we didn’t deserve more.”
He had a point about James McAtee’s challenge on Ian Maatsen, which forced the defender off and might have merited more than yellow. But the red card that never came was not the reason Villa lost. Their own performance was.
Forest outshot them 22-7 and controlled the second half. Emery burned through his substitutions by the 63rd minute trying to change the flow, only to see Maatsen limp off and leave Villa a man down. In midfield, Ross Barkley and Boubacar Kamara repeatedly gave the ball away in dangerous areas. Kamara’s error led directly to Delap’s opener.
Nicolas Jackson, meant to be the focal point up front, left at half-time under the cloud of a booking and the fear of a second. Tammy Abraham, his replacement, barely registered. When Johan Manzambi volleyed his first touch for the club straight into touch, it felt like the afternoon in one frame.
17. Manchester United (last week: 10th)
Manchester United 0-1 Manchester City
Strip out the VAR controversy. What remains is a deeply underwhelming display.
Ironically, Foden’s red card may have hurt United more than City. With 11 v 10, Michael Carrick’s side slowed the game down, passed sideways, and seemed paralysed by the responsibility to take control. Their best efforts were long-range strikes from Marcus Rashford and Kobbie Mainoo that clipped the post. It took until the 70th minute for them to register a shot on target.
Key figures shrank. Bruno Fernandes, usually the heartbeat, drifted through the game. Carrick’s in-game management invited scrutiny: Benjamin Sesko, a natural centre-forward, remained on the bench far too long against a defence reduced in number but not in organisation.
City’s superiority in structure and belief was stark. The gap between the squads looked as wide as ever. VAR may have dominated the headlines, but United’s performance posed the harder questions.
18. Crystal Palace (last week: 11th)
Crystal Palace 2-3 Ipswich Town
Pierre Sage did not hide behind excuses. “We have to prevent the crosses and be more aggressive in the box.” Simple, obvious, and currently beyond his team.
Disasi’s first-half red card hurt, but it did not cause the defensive chaos that followed. Palace’s issues are more basic than that. For Ipswich’s first, Emersonn was allowed a free header between Disasi — appealing for offside instead of marking — and Honest Ahanor, caught in no man’s land. Three centre-backs on the pitch, no one doing the fundamental job.
For the second, Daichi Kamada failed to help Tyrick Mitchell in a two-on-one. For the third, no one stopped Julio Enciso’s cross, and no one tracked the run that followed. Seconds later, Davis won yet another header in the Palace box. The same errors, on loop.
At 2-2, Khalaili somehow missed a golden chance that could have flipped the narrative. Instead, Palace walk away with more questions than answers, and a manager who knows exactly where the problems lie but not yet how to fix them.
19. Coventry City (last week: 6th)
Coventry City 0-5 Brighton
Frank Lampard’s assessment — “we did some good stuff but then the game became very difficult” — was honest enough. The trouble is, the good stuff barely lasted.
Coventry’s defensive fragility, evident in their previous home defeat to Hull, resurfaced with a vengeance. The second goal, a calamity in which Aurele Amenda failed to get to the ball before Yalcouye, opened the floodgates. Taiwo Awoniyi’s red card at 53 minutes ended the contest entirely.
Brighton were quicker to every loose ball, sharper in every duel. Kostoulas beat Bobby Thomas to a challenge by a fraction for the penalty that led to the third goal. That split-second summed up the afternoon: Brighton always that bit ahead.
Coventry did fashion chances, especially in a 10-minute flurry around the half-hour mark, but a lack of conviction in front of goal is becoming a worrying habit. At both ends, naivety is costing them.
20. Newcastle United (last week: 12th)
Leeds United 4-1 Newcastle United
Alan Shearer called it “an absolute s*** show” at half-time on X. He was not exaggerating.
By then, Newcastle were 3-0 down and being torn apart. The first hour was a humiliation. Calvert-Lewin manhandled Botman and Thiaw, dominating them in the air and on the deck. In midfield, the loss of Nico Gonzalez to concussion after 19 minutes forced 18-year-old Sean Steur alongside 20-year-old Lewis Miley. Expecting that pair to cope with Stach, Ampadu and Tanaka was a fantasy.
Steur’s loose pass gifted Leeds their second, officially credited to Bogle but spiritually owned by Calvert-Lewin, whose towering leap over both centre-backs created the chaos. Newcastle were overrun in the middle, brittle at the back and toothless going forward until a raft of substitutions belatedly sparked some life — six of their seven shots arrived after the break.
By then, the damage was long done. On performance alone, no team had a worse weekend.
