Sports Mole selects its Premier League Team of the Week for gameweek eight, including Mohamed Salah, Declan Rice and Scott McTominay.
The two North London clubs lead the way at the top of the Premier League table heading into the international break, as Arsenal rounded off gameweek eight by beating Manchester City 1-0 to end a 12-game top-flight losing run against the treble winners.
A 10-man Tottenham Hotspur side overcame Luton Town by the same scoreline to cement their position at the summit, while Liverpool are in the fourth and final Champions League position despite dropping two points in a 2-2 stalemate with Brighton & Hove Albion.
Manchester United avoided a third successive home defeat in a nail-biting 2-1 triumph over Brentford, while Chelsea clicked into gear at Turf Moor, comfortably putting Burnley to the sword by four goals to one.
West Ham United left it late to rescue a point in a 2-2 draw with Newcastle United, while the spoils were also shared in a West Midlands derby between Aston Villa and Wolverhampton Wanderers, which ended 1-1.
Elsewhere, Everton claimed a morale-boosting 3-0 triumph over cellar-dwelling Bournemouth, Sheffield United remain without a victory owing to a 3-1 loss to Fulham, while Crystal Palace‘s goalless draw with Nottingham Forest was best forgotten about.
Here, Sports Mole selects its Premier League Team of the Week for gameweek eight.
DEFENCE
© Reuters
Neither set of supporters got their money’s worth at Selhurst Park on Saturday evening, but Sam Johnstone once again came up clutch for Roy Hodgson‘s side when they needed it most, making five crucial saves before he links up with the England camp for October’s internationals.
One of Johnstone’s five stops saw him stick out a strong arm to deny Forest centre-back Murillo, who made a dazzling solo run before letting fly and also could have registered an assist by virtue of a wonderful long ball over the top for Morgan Gibbs-White – who could only clip the post – but the Brazilian is already proving an astute acquisition for Steve Cooper‘s side.
Earning a slice of history to go alongside his first Tottenham goal, Micky van de Ven quickly readjusted his feet to sidefoot home from James Maddison‘s cutback and propel a 10-man Spurs team to a battling win at Kenilworth Road, thereby becoming the 167th different Premier League goalscorer for the North London club – more than any other team in the top flight – and he was a rock at the back as ever with a 94% passing accuracy and three out of three ground duels won.
Unlike at his former club Brentford, James Tarkowski did not contribute a goal to Everton’s triumph over Bournemouth, but the Englishman was near-faultless in the Toffees rearguard, registering eight clearances, three tackles and winning two-thirds of his aerial duels to come away with a merited clean sheet and three points.
MIDFIELD
© Reuters
Mohamed Salah‘s streak of Premier League goal contributions may have been broken in last week’s painful Tottenham beating, but the Egyptian reverted to type at the Amex Stadium, calmly picking out the bottom corner to level matters before finding the same side of the net from 12 yards, and he has now been involved in 14 top-flight goals against Brighton, his joint-most against a single opponent alongside Manchester United.
Speaking of the Red Devils, Erik ten Hag‘s blushes were spared and then some by a flying Scotsman, as with the 20-time English champions on course to lose three successive Premier League home games for the first time ever, substitute Scott McTominay expertly brought the ball down and picked out the corner before heading home an extraordinary winner in the seventh minute of added time; whether such a heroic cameo could breathe new life into his stalling club career remains to be seen.
One player whose club career is going from strength to strength is Chelsea new boy Cole Palmer, who showed Man City what they were missing at the Emirates with a wonderful display against Burnley, becoming Chelsea’s second-youngest penalty goalscorer in the Premier League – only behind Oscar – before laying off Nicolas Jackson to complete an emphatic victory.
While Palmer left Lancashire a happy man, his Man City teammates finally lost their golden touch against Arsenal, whose £105m man Declan Rice dominated proceedings from start to finish. The England international – who was also on the champions’ summer wishlist – made a crucial goal-line clearance just six minutes in and came up with three tackles, three interceptions and one block to help justify his nine-figure price tag.
Palmer is not the only former Citizen to have shone in a different shade of blue this weekend, as Everton’s Jack Harrison doubled his side’s lead against Bournemouth with an unbelievable long-range effort – which cannoned off the bar and in – before his blocked header fell kindly for Abdoulaye Doucoure to complete a terrific Toffees treble.
ATTACK
© Reuters
Joining two of his esteemed compatriots in an exclusive scoring club, Newcastle marksman Alexander Isak took the ball in his stride to draw the Magpies level against West Ham before calmly tapping home from Kieran Trippier‘s cross, in turn becoming just the third Swedish player to score in three consecutive Premier League games after Freddie Ljungberg and Zlatan Ibrahimovic.
Only two days after being overlooked for an England call-up once again, a galvanised Raheem Sterling sent out quite the message to Gareth Southgate by having a hand in three of Chelsea’s four goals against Burnley – providing the cross for Ameen Al-Dakhil to turn into his own net, winning the penalty for Palmer to convert and getting in on the act himself by picking out the far corner – and should the winger continue in the same vein, one suspects it will not be long before he dons the Three Lions strip again.
Sports Mole’s Premier League Team of the Week (3-5-2): Johnstone; Van de Ven, Murillo, Tarkowski; Salah, Rice, Palmer, McTominay, Harrison; Isak, Sterling
