Football writer Alex Keble highlights the hot topics and tactical lessons from Matchweek 25 including:
- Marmoush and Gonzalez lead a more direct, tenacious Man City
- Chelsea’s poor form feels worryingly like a Maresca-made problem
- Man Utd’s midfield issues continue in injury-defined mismatch
- Merino as a No 9 is an Arteta masterstroke
- Wolves’ overly-aggressive formation does too much early damage
- Inspired Palmer somehow prevents a Villa victory
- Nuno’s 3-5-2 leaves too much space for Traore and Iwobi
- AFC Bournemouth are suddenly in pole position for a UEFA Champions League spot
- Moyes and Beto now have top 10 in their sights
- Brentford’s home and away form has completely flipped
Marmoush and Gonzalez lead a more direct, tenacious Man City
Manchester City’s decision to spend big in January already looks to have come off.
They are now back up into the UEFA Champions League places and, having thumped one of their rivals for fourth, look primed for a revival.
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Omar Marmoush’s hat-trick and Nico Gonzalez’s metronomic control of midfield were the defining factors against Newcastle United on Saturday, and what’s most interesting about these two is that, from a tactical perspective, they pull in opposite directions.
Marmoush allows Man City to play longer, stretching the pitch and finding a more direct route forward to puncture the sense that Pep Guardiola’s possession-based positional football had grown stale.
Ederson’s assist for his opener was an obvious example of a new forward-thinking City strategy, and it formed part of a wider pattern; City completed 39 long passes, their most in a Premier League match since 2 November.
City’s goalkeeper also launched 13 goal kicks (his fourth-most this season) and played 30.2 per cent of his non-goal kick passes long, his second-highest percentage of the campaign to date.
Gonzalez does the exact opposite, shortening the pitch and reasserting some command of a central midfield that was lost without Rodri.
“He is our mini Rodri,” Guardiola told BBC Sport. “He has a huge presence, his pace, and his time at Barcelona academy, it is all about the ball and positioning.”
Gonzalez completed four tackles and interceptions, had 112 touches, and made 100 passes, on all counts more than anyone else on the pitch.
Gonzalez's midfield stats v Newcastle
| Statistic | Total | Match rank |
| Touches | 112 | 1st |
|---|---|---|
| Completed passes | 100 | 1st |
| Pass accuracy | 97.1% | 1st |
| Passes into final third | 13 | 1st |
| Carries | 66 | 1st |
| Tackles and interceptions | 4 | 1st |
It helped City to 721 touches of the ball, their second-most in a league match since 9 November, while allowing only 12 passes into their defensive third, their fewest in any game since playing Southampton on 26 October.
Gonzalez adds control, Marmoush adds disorder. It’s the perfect mix to get City back on their feet.
Chelsea’s poor form feels worryingly like a Maresca-made problem
Chelsea have won only nine points from their last nine Premier League matches after taking 34 from their first 16. That’s a drop from 2.1 points per game to 1.0 points per match.
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It’s a trend defined mostly by Nicolas Jackson’s returning profligacy (prior to his injury) and a surprising downturn from Cole Palmer, who has now gone five matches in all competitions without a goal or assist.
But it might concern Chelsea supporters that the team's form has dipped the more it resembles Enzo Maresca’s principles.
Maresca was renowned for slow, chess-like possession football at Leicester City, and during Chelsea’s fast and transition-heavy first half of the 2024/25 campaign, he often suggested his team were not yet following his instructions closely.
Perhaps now they are. Chelsea held 69.5 per cent possession at Brighton & Hove Albion but failed to have a single shot on target, following a new trend.
Since their poor form began, they are averaging 62.2 per cent possession, up from 56.6 per cent across the first 16 matches of the season.
Chelsea look risk-averse and overly structured. Fair enough if it’s simply waning confidence. But if this is a result of Maresca’s coaching, then they have a problem.
Man Utd’s midfield issues continue in injury-defined mismatch
Tottenham Hotspur welcomed big players back from injury just as Manchester United lost several of theirs, a switch of fortune that defined Spurs' win as the returning James Maddison scored the winner against an injury-stricken United team.
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“There’s definitely empathy there [with Ruben Amorim’s position],” Ange Postecoglou said after Sunday's match.
“Welcome to my world. But that’s for one game. Do that for two months.”
Man Utd fans will be praying it isn’t that long, because although there was an inevitable decline, with Joshua Zirkzee forced to play as a No 10, in truth United’s midfield issues were just an extension of an already-existing problem.
Bruno Fernandes and Casemiro were overwhelmed by the combinations between Spurs’ midfield three and inverting full-back Djed Spence. They were simply outnumbered, as is so often the case in Amorim's 3-4-3 formation.
Man Utd's midfield shape
They missed Kobbie Mainoo and Amad, yes. But this is a pattern that goes far beyond a developing injury crisis.
United have lost 12 of their 25 Premier League matches, their most defeats at this stage since 1973/74 (13) – when they were relegated.
Amorim is adamant he won’t change. Maybe injuries will finally force his hand.
Merino as a No 9 is an Arteta masterstroke
Just when it looked like Arsenal’s injury problems would lead to a hugely damaging 0-0 draw at Leicester, Mikel Arteta found a creative solution that could just keep Arsenal in the title race over the coming weeks.
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And it really was a masterstroke; a decision that nobody saw coming, not even the player himself.
“It was big news for me this morning when one of the assistants told me this was an option. It's the first time in my career that I've played in this position,” Mikel Merino told BBC Sport.
“Mikel told me to use my strengths in the box and I was in the right place at the right time. I've not trained there once but I know what everyone has to do on the pitch.”
Arteta presumably meant Merino’s aerial ability, as we saw for the first goal. The composure on the second was surely a surprise to the manager.
Thirteen of Arsenal’s 51 Premier League goals have been cross assisted, the most in the division, while Arsenal have scored the third-most headed goals, with eight.
As strange as it sounds, Merino is the target man, the proper No 9, that Arsenal have craved.
Wolves’ overly-aggressive formation does too much early damage
Wolverhampton Wanderers were assertive in attack, bullish in their pressing and could easily have snatched a late point as they limited Liverpool to zero shots on goal in the second half, the first time that has ever happened at Anfield since records began in 2003/04.
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It is perhaps a little mean, then, to focus on the problems with Vitor Pereira’s hybrid 5-2-3 formation, but both Liverpool goals came from Wolves committing too many bodies forward when the formation flipped to a slightly wild 2-3-5.
Wing-backs Rayan Ait-Nouri and Nelson Semedo – plus centre-back Matt Doherty – all surged forward when Wolves had possession, meaning there were five and sometimes even six players in their forward line.
It also meant that while Liverpool huffed and puffed against a low block, as soon as a Wolves counter broke down, Liverpool found enormous amounts of space.
The build-up to Liverpool's opening goal was in keeping with the first half as the Reds found a three on three, as shown below.
Then for the second, Wolves’ assertiveness meant one pass into midfield took seven visiting players out of the game, leading to the though-ball that won Luis Diaz a penalty.
Inspired Palmer somehow prevents a Villa victory
Goalkeeper debuts don’t get much better than this. Alex Palmer was given man of the match for his heroics at Villa Park, where a string of impressive saves earned 10-man Ipswich Town an improbable point.
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Aston Villa have dropped far too many points recently, their top-four hopes dangling by a thread now after a four-match winless streak that has included three encounters against bottom-half clubs.
But they couldn’t have done much more on Saturday afternoon.
Villa recorded a post-shot Expected Goals (xG) of 2.6, meaning that based on where their shots hit the target, they were "expected" to score 1.6 more than in reality.
They also took 25 shots, their most in a league game this season, and underperformed their xG by 1.0, their most in any match against a team not currently in the top six.
Aston Villa shot map v Ipswich
Nuno’s 3-5-2 leaves too much space for Traore and Iwobi
Nuno Espirito Santo’s 3-5-2 will probably be a short-lived experiment. The surprise formation shift worked amazingly in the 7-0 victory over Brighton, but at Fulham, it was Nottingham Forest’s downfall.
The most notorious issue with the 3-5-2 is that it becomes a flat 5-3-2 when out of possession, leaving just one defender out wide - and therefore big gaps on either side of the midfielders.
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Fulham exploited this repeatedly. Adama Traore and Alex Iwobi had far too much space on the wings as the visitors easily maneuvered the ball out wide, where there was no Forest winger to support a full-back and prevent uncontested crosses into the box.
The build-up to the first goal and the shot that led to the corner for the second goal, as you can see below, both reveal the same flaw, one that was not patched up by Nuno until he abandoned the formation – too late – in the 69th minute.
AFC Bournemouth are suddenly in pole position for a Champions League spot
AFC Bournemouth will have always expected to beat Southampton. But they probably didn’t expect Forest, Chelsea, Newcastle and Villa to all drop points, moving them up into fifth, a potential UEFA Champions League spot.
They are suddenly favourites to qualify, as implausible as that would have sounded at the start of the campaign.
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No European football is a significant advantage over most of their rivals, but more than that, Andoni Iraola’s side shows no sign of slowing down.
They have lost only once in all competitions since 9 November, against leaders Liverpool, and they don’t play anyone in the current top seven until 3 May.
By then, Bournemouth could be above a faltering Forest and well on their way to playing among Europe’s finest.
Moyes and Beto now have top 10 in their sights
Some doubted both the logic and the romance in bringing David Moyes back to Everton. There are no doubters left anymore.
Everton have won 13 points from a possible 15 since his return, the joint-most in that time alongside Liverpool and Arsenal. Incredibly, it has ended their fears of relegation and begun talk of a top-10 finish.
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And why not? Everton are playing with an intensity and a purpose missing through most of the 2024/25 campaign, and better still, are discovering star players who never got a look in under Sean Dyche.
Carlos Alcaraz scored one and assisted the other on his first league start of the season. Beto has started just four matches – all under Moyes – and rewarded the returning manager with four goals, as many as in his previous 42 Premier League appearances.
Jake O’Brien had started one league game this season before Moyes took over, but is now a regular at right-back. Jesper Lindstrom has started four times under new management after starting just eight times this season under Dyche.
If Everton look like a new team, that’s because they are. The talent was always there. Now it is starting to show.
Brentford’s home and away form has completely flipped
As Villa slip, there is a small window of opportunity opening for one of the mid-table clubs to rise up and challenge for a place in Europe.
Brentford are best-placed to do so after finally solving their away form. They hadn’t won a single one of their opening nine away league matches this season. Now they have won three in a row.
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It’s a strange quirk, however, that after boasting the best home form in the Premier League in early December, Brentford haven’t won at the Gtech Community Stadium in the last six attempts across all competitions.
Just as the away form was fixed, the home form has floundered.
If Thomas Frank can find a way to balance the two, Brentford can make up the seven-point gap to seventh.
