Ten KEY questions for the 2026/27 Premier League season

Can experience and Pep’s departure help Arteta become the fourth coach to retain the title?

Pep Guardiola, Sir Alex Ferguson, Jose Mourinho: in the 34-year history of the competition only three managers have won back-to-back Premier League titles.

Retaining the crown is one of the hardest things to do in the modern Premier League, such is the depth of competition but Mikel Arteta may believe fortune has offered him a rare opportunity.

The theme of 2026/27 is change, with five of the "Big Six" effectively starting new projects and a record nine new managers at the start of the season.

In the eye of the storm is calm: an Arsenal side settled in personnel, experience and tactics. They are established Premier League royalty now, in theory even more relaxed and self-assured now the monkey is off their back and that title, five years in the making, is theirs.

By contrast Michael Carrick at Manchester United and Roberto De Zerbi at Tottenham Hotspur enter their first full campaigns while Liverpool, Chelsea and Manchester City have brand new managers.

This may give Arsenal the edge, especially when it comes to rivals Man City. Guardiola’s departure certainly appears to open the door to a period of domination for the Gunners, coached by the only Premier League title-winning manager in the division.

How will Man City move on from the Guardiola dynasty?

Man City are at a crossroads. This could be one of the most important seasons in their modern history.

Enzo Maresca has the task of replacing a club and Premier League legend; a genius in his field who broke all kinds of records. It can go one of two ways.

Either Maresca will be like Arne Slot, who produced instant continuity after the Jurgen Klopp era at Liverpool, or like Unai Emery and David Moyes, who struggled badly in the aftermath of the Arsene Wenger and Ferguson dynasties ending at Arsenal and Man Utd.

That being said, the Man City hierarchy have gone down a different route to those clubs. After years of building the club’s identity around Guardiola, City have understandably decided to appoint a Guardiola protégé.

Maresca is Guardiola through and through: a possession-centric manager whose tactical ideas could not be more closely aligned with those of his former mentor. Will he continue the magic, or will such a significant change in the dressing room (Bernardo Silva and John Stones are also gone) lead to a fallow period for the eight-time Premier League champions?

Will Alonso re-energise Chelsea and become the next great Premier League manager?

From a neutral perspective the most exciting of the record-breaking nine managerial appointments is Xabi Alonso, a rising star who achieved an unthinkable invincible season with Bayer Leverkusen in 2023/24.

Alonso is one of the most sought-after coaches in world football and, arriving in the Premier League not long after Klopp and Guardiola have departed, he might just be the division’s next great coach.

An explosive start is possible. Chelsea do not have European football to contend with, an advantage that helped Antonio Conte get his ideas across in his debut year at Chelsea in 2016/17, the last time Chelsea won the title. Incidentally, only six managers have previously won the Premier League in their debut seasons – and three of them were at Chelsea.

Joining Conte, Jose Mourinho and Carlo Ancelotti in that exclusive club is on the cards for Alonso.

Those free midweeks will be spent working on world-class tactical ideas, while an already-strong squad has finally been strengthened with experience as Danny Welbeck and Jordan Henderson become the first over-30s players signed in the BlueCo era.

It’s a symbolic shift that suggests a wider change in strategy and a new focus. Alonso, leading the way, could yield instant results.

Will De Zerbi, Iraola and other new coaches bring attacking football back?

Some fans bemoaned the Premier League’s turn towards set-pieces last season.

The goals-per-game rate dropped only slightly from 2.40 to 2.36 last season, but looking at a longer trend, the open-play Expected Goals (xG) were down sharply.

The manager changes should swing us back towards 2023/24, widely seen as the peak year of fast and wild end-to-end attacking football.

De Zerbi preaches hard pressing and pulsating attacking football, a vision he was unable to implement (for time) towards the end of last season but will surely begin this summer at Spurs.

Andoni Iraola represents the return to "heavy-metal" football that many Liverpool fans wanted, bringing a style from Bournemouth that had lit up the league.

Elsewhere Alonso’s Real Madrid and Leverkusen scored loads of goals. New Bournmouth head coach Marco Rose is from the RB Leipzig/Borussia Dortmund school of aggressive German attacking football. Crystal Palace’s Pierre Sage is similarly all about fast breaks and hard pressing.

The influx of new managers should turn the Premier League back towards open attacking football.

Is this the year Man Utd challenge for the title again?

Carrick was appointed caretaker manager of Man Utd on 14 January and three days later led the team to a 2-0 victory over Man City, thus beginning an exceptional five-month spell that earned him the job full-time – and a chance, just maybe, to put United among the challengers again.

There is no need for deep analysis to explain why Man Utd are in the running. The Premier League table since his arrival in January says it all. Across his 17 games – almost half a season – Man Utd were top of the pile.

Carrick just needs to carry on doing what he’s doing. Repeat those results twice and Man Utd will win the Premier League title for the first time since 2013.

Football is rarely this simple, of course but United’s form under Carrick is ample reason for renewed confidence about what the future may hold.

Will record number of new beginnings make this the year of the comeback star?

Returning to the theme of change, all those new managerial appointments means a fresh start for a whole host of players either sidelined under previous regimes or who missed large chunks of 2025/26 through injury.

It could make this the year of the comeback. There are just so many names to choose from.

Phil Foden and Cole Palmer hope to roar back from disappointing campaigns and missing out on the England World Cup squad. Marcus Rashford and Mason Mount are fighting for a place at Man Utd.

Harvey Elliott, Omar Marmoush and Andy Robertson are among the players who struggled for game time last season who will expect to bounce back.

Yoane Wissa will hope for better form under a new manager and as for those returning from injury, Levi Colwill and Alexander Isak stand out as forgotten stars.

How will Villa and Newcastle handle a summer of major change?

This time last year we previewed Newcastle United and Aston Villa as potential UEFA Champions League contenders because so little had changed at either club. That continuity has gone out the window this summer.

Newcastle’s upheaval has been monumental in scope. Eddie Howe’s resignation and the appointment of Matthias Jaissle is a big change in itself, but the new boss must contend with losing arguably his three biggest stars: Bruno Guimaraes, Anthony Gordon and Sandro Tonali.

In their place come Lukas Hornicek, Bazoumana Toure, Aladji Bamba, Sean Steur and Ewen Jaouen, each for a sizable fee and each with an impressive CV.

Villa’s changes aren’t quite as dramatic considering Emery remains in charge but there is similarly a sense of one era ending and a new one beginning.

Youri Tielemans, Morgan Rogers and Lucas Digne have all left, and, like Newcastle, there is a real buzz around all of the new signings: Alejandro Garnacho, Johan Manzambi and Joao Gomes.

Will Europe be a blessing or a curse for the newer qualifiers?

Nine Premier League clubs qualified for Europe last season and for those new (or new-ish) to European football the excitement of playing midweek is tempered by thoughts of a potential impact on domestic results.

Juggling two competitions can go either way, of course. Last season Aston Villa won the UEFA Europa League and came fourth, while you’d be hard pushed to find a Crystal Palace fan not perfectly satisfied to have paid the price of 15th in the Premier League in exchange for their UEFA Conference League triumph.

But Nottingham Forest, Spurs and Newcastle – all bottom-half finishers – appeared to struggle playing so many games.

This season, Brighton & Hove Albion play in the Conference League for the very first time (and second-ever in Europe) and will have serious hopes of emulating Palace, themselves probably experienced enough to manage a Europa League campaign in 2026/27.

But fans of Bournemouth and Sunderland, who both qualified for the Europa League, may worry about squad depth. It will be fascinating to see the impact of those unforgettable games under the lights.

And it will be fascinating to see if it begins a period of yo-yoing in and out of the European places for the Premier League’s newly-strong middle class.

Leeds United, for example, have made some strong signings and might believe their chances of a top-nine finish improves because so many of their rivals have to contend with Thursday night football.

Similarly Brentford, who just missed out last season, again have free midweeks to work on Keith Andrews’ meticulous plans.

Do good summers for the mid-table sides suggest a stronger league than ever?

Leeds and Brentford aren’t the only ones with big ambitions.

Fulham have hired ex-Real Madrid manager Alvaro Arbeloa, who has brought two Real signings with him, which is enough to get Fulham fans hopeful he can build on Marco Silva’s foundation. Fulham were only a point short of the European places last season.

Nottingham Forest now have Oliver Glasner in charge, a man who won the Conference League and FA Cup for Crystal Palace. Even without Elliot Anderson, sold to Man City, they will hope for a 2026/27 similar to their seventh-place finish of two years ago.

Everton, too, look stronger. They should be settled in their new home and, more importantly, boast continuity in David Moyes that few other clubs have this season. Hayden Hackney, Christian Norgaard and Brennan Johnson clearly improve the team.

All of which leaves the Premier League in a very healthy position – with almost no clubs holding an obvious weakness.

Are the promoted clubs as well-equipped as last season’s trio?

Coventry City, Ipswich Town and Hull City have all had very busy windows, as you might expect.

Sunderland’s splurge last summer proved very effective as they catapulted into Europe and, along with Leeds, ended a two-year run of the promoted clubs going straight back down. A similar approach from this year’s three newcomers was to be expected, then.

Interestingly, all three clubs appear to have prioritised buying established internationals from mainland Europe over Premier League experience, although Ipswich (Issa Diop, Sasa Lukic) and Hull (Matt Targett, Jack Butland) have added a couple.

It is very difficult to predict how they will fare. After all, many assumed Sunderland and Leeds would go straight back down in 2025/26.

Coventry won the Championship at a canter and have a very experienced manager in Frank Lampard, while Ipswich have been here recently and, in Gary O’Neil, have appointed someone who kept up Bournemouth and Wolverhampton Wanderers.

Hull are in the least enviable position, not least because their xG for and against last season had them all the way down in 23rd out of 24 sides in Opta’s "Expected Points" Championship table.

But even Hull – the favourites to finish bottom – will look forward to the campaign with great excitement and optimism, this being their first time back since 2017.

Indeed, every single club feels just as hopeful in the run up to a season that looks likely to be stronger, more competitive and more entertaining than last year.