Score: Brentford 3 - 0 Chelsea

Maybe it was planned rotation by Xabi Alonso, or maybe it was injury enforced rotation, we might never know. What it was was dour, turgid, and lacking any fight or grit. Chelsea started the game well enough, but found it difficult to break down Brentford’s extremely well drilled and well organized defensive ranks. As the half wore on, Chelsea looked less and less up for the fight, and Brentford were growing in to the game.

Chelsea looked like a collection of very talented footballers who had met approximately twelve minutes before kickoff. The Blues have now conceded in every game this season, and there is a growing sense that you can score against them simply by being vaguely persistent.

The problem isn't that Chelsea don't have attacking talent. They clearly do. The problem is that they keep making life incredibly easy for the opposition.

Brentford didn't need to do anything magical here.

They just kept asking Chelsea questions.

Eventually, Chelsea ran out of answers.

Score: Spurs 2 - 3 Villa

Spurs have scored a Premier League goal. I repeat Spurs have scored a Premier League goal, this is not a drill! Too bad they are still winless and sit rock bottom of the league.

Aston Villa have finally won a football match. And naturally, they did it by beating Tottenham in a game that Tottenham probably should have won.

Spurs were the better side for long stretches. They created chances. They had control. They looked like the team that was supposed to win. And then they didn't.

Villa were clinical when they got their opportunities, and suddenly the team that couldn't score in its first four league games had three goals.

Funny how football works.

Villa took control late in the first half and then punished Tottenham again after the break. Spurs eventually woke up, scored twice late and made everyone briefly wonder whether they were about to pull off one of the most ridiculous comebacks imaginable. They weren't.

The more worrying part for Tottenham is that they are now five games into the season without a win and remain stuck near the bottom of the table (dead last after Fulham drew with Manchester United).

At some point, you can't keep saying the performance was promising. You have to actually win the bloody game.

For Villa, meanwhile, this could be the result that finally gets their season moving. They've been bad. They weren't bad here. And, most importantly, they won.

Score: Seagulls 3 - 0 Black Arsenal

Well, that escalated quickly.

Arsenal came into this one perfect. Four games. Four wins. Twelve points. One goal conceded. Then Brighton decided that was cute.

Three goals. Three!

Arsenal were absolutely beaten here. Not unlucky. Not robbed. Not victims of some outrageous refereeing decision. Beaten.

Brighton were faster, more aggressive and far more comfortable in possession. Their pressing caused Arsenal problems all afternoon, and once Brighton got ahead, Arsenal never really looked capable of getting back into the game.

Pascal Groß opened the scoring, Charalampos Kostoulas added another before halftime and Chema Andrés finished the job shortly after the break.

Arsenal just didn't look like Arsenal. The normally reliable defense made mistakes. They lost duels, they failed to close down shots, and Raya was well beaten from range twice. They struggled to deal with Brighton's intensity. And the attack never really got going.

Mikel Arteta admitted Brighton were the better team, which is probably the easiest thing he's had to say all season.

The funny thing is that this doesn't suddenly make Arsenal a bad team.

It does, however, remind everyone that this league is enormous, and you don't get to spend the season collecting three points just because you won the first four games.

Brighton, meanwhile, are ridiculous. Sixteen goals in five games. Sixteen!

If you're looking for a team that is going to be involved in some absolute nonsense this season, keep an eye on Brighton. They are very, very fun.

Score: Everton 1 - 0 Ipswich

Everton just quietly keep doing Everton things. One goal. Three points.

Move along.

Barry's goal (not that he knew so much about it) was enough to beat Ipswich, who had started the season looking like they might have something interesting going on after collecting six points from their first four games.

Not this time.

Everton were organized, defended well and didn't give Ipswich much to work with. It wasn't spectacular, but it didn't need to be. This is the sort of game Everton have to win if they're going to avoid getting dragged into another relegation fight.

Ipswich, meanwhile, have finally discovered that Premier League games sometimes involve losing. They're still ahead of where plenty of people expected them to be.

But this was a reminder that the league isn't going to let them have nice things every weekend.

Score: Newcastle 2 - 1 Hull

Hull are finally beaten.

Newcastle started brilliantly, scoring twice inside the opening seven minutes, and for about ten minutes this looked like it might become another one of those games where you wonder why the opposition bothered turning up.

Then Hull did what Hull do. They fought. The Tigers pulled one back before halftime and spent the rest of the game making Newcastle increasingly uncomfortable. Newcastle had the lead.

Hull had the momentum, and suddenly everyone involved was sweating. Newcastle held on, which is the important bit, but this was not exactly a statement performance.

Hull continue to be remarkably annoying.

They've now played five games and already look like a team nobody is going to enjoy playing against.

Newcastle, meanwhile, desperately need some stability after the chaos of the summer.

Three points is three points.

We'll leave it there.

Score: Forest 0 - 1 Coventry

Coventry have won a Premier League football match for the first time in 25 years. There are plenty of Sky Blues supporters who have never seen this event. And they did it at the City Ground.

That is some story.

Coventry came into this game having lost their first four matches and conceded ten goals. Things were not exactly looking brilliant.

Then Jay Dasilva scored. Coventry defended like their lives depended on it.

Nottingham Forest thought they had found a late equalizer through Igor Jesus, only for VAR to intervene and rule it out.

Cue absolute chaos. Coventry held on.

Frank Lampard gets his first Premier League win as Coventry manager.

And the Sky Blues are no longer bottom of the table.

Look, nobody should get carried away after one win. But football isn't always about getting carried away for sensible reasons.

Sometimes a team that has lost four straight games goes somewhere it hasn't won in years, scores once and hangs on for dear life.

And sometimes that's brilliant.

Welcome back to the Premier League, Coventry.

Score: Bournemouth 0 - 1 Liverpool

Andoni Iraola is the only manager not named Mikel Arteta to win a football match at the Vitality Arena in 2026. To Bournemouth’s chagrin, Iraola no longer works in the home dugout.

Liverpool were not particularly good.

Alexander Isak scored the only goal of the game, finishing off a move that involved Cody Gakpo and Florian Wirtz, but the performance was much less convincing than the result.

Liverpool managed just six shots on goal and spent long periods struggling to make the attack click.

And yet they won. That's the important part.

There will be plenty of conversation about Wirtz, the attack, the midfield and whether this Liverpool side has quite figured itself out yet. But they have done something very few in recent memory have, and come away from Bournemouth with three points and a clean sheet.

That's the sort of result that can look much more important in November than it does in September.

Bournemouth, meanwhile, continue to be Bournemouth. They play aggressively. They create chances. They make games entertaining.

And they keep finding ways to lose them.

Marco Rose is going to have a very long season if they don't start turning these performances into points.

Score: Leeds 0 - 0 Palace

Well, this was rubbish.

Not every football match is a five-goal thriller.

Sometimes you get Leeds and Palace on an afternoon where absolutely nobody can score.

Leeds remain unbeaten, which is the good news. The less good news is that this was a pretty uninspiring performance in attack.

Crystal Palace, on the other hand, finally kept a clean sheet after conceding eleven goals across their previous four games. Progress.

Palace even had a goal ruled out by VAR, while Leeds' best opportunity came through Dominic Calvert-Lewin. But neither side did enough to win it.

Leeds will probably be happier with the point given the way the game played out. Palace will definitely be happier with the clean sheet.

Nobody is going to be talking about this one in six months.

Unless, of course, Leeds finish somewhere near the top of the table and spend the entire season pointing back at all the boring little points they collected along the way.

In which case, suddenly this 0-0 will be very important.

Score: City 5 - 3 Sunderland

Eight. That’s the number of goals we were treated to in this one.

Manchester City scored five.

Sunderland scored three.

And somehow City still looked like they were going to have a nervous breakdown before the final whistle.

Antoine Semenyo scored twice, Erling Haaland eventually put the game beyond Sunderland and City maintained their perfect start.

But Sunderland deserve an enormous amount of credit. Brian Brobbey scored a hat trick, Sunderland kept coming back and for long stretches they made City work far harder than they probably expected.

City eventually won because they have Erling Haaland and because Manchester City tend to eventually decide that they're going to score as many goals as necessary.

But defensively?

Hmm.

Five wins from five is obviously ridiculous. Seven straight wins in all competitions is even more ridiculous. But conceding three goals at home to Sunderland is the sort of thing that Enzo Maresca probably doesn't want becoming a habit.

The good news for City is that they keep winning.

The bad news for everyone else is that they keep winning while looking like they still have another gear.

Score: Fulham 1 - 1 United

Oh, Manchester United.

What are we doing here?

United managed to avoid losing a third straight game thanks to a late Matheus Cunha equalizer, but this was another performance that left more questions than answers.

Fulham took the lead through a Lisandro Martínez own goal and looked perfectly capable of holding onto the advantage.

Then United got themselves out of trouble.

Again.

And that's basically where we are with United right now. They're not completely awful. They're not particularly good either. They're just... there.

A team that keeps finding itself in games where it needs something to happen rather than a team that makes things happen.

Cunha's goal was deflected, which feels appropriate.

United need to find some momentum because four points from five games is not the sort of start anyone at Old Trafford would have wanted.

And the international break has now arrived, which gives Michael Carrick some time to figure out what this team is supposed to look like.

Because at the moment, I'm not sure they know.

And I'm increasingly not sure anyone else does either.