Most excited about: Seeing whether the throng of new managers who have been thrown into fascinating positions sink or swim. Least excited about: Hearing what José Mourinho has to say about things four times a week. Also, I hear Manchester City have bought a decent young Englishman. If managed well, his arrival at Newcastle could be transformational. Young player of the season: Aleksandar Mitrovic seems to be the type of player who causes regular headaches for defenders and disciplinary commissions alike – and he’s brilliant on Football Manager. Signing of the season: Full-backs don’t always get a lot of attention but Matteo Darmian addresses a serious long-term need at Manchester United and could eclipse some of the club’s more loudly-trumpeted arrivals. If the confidence needed to attack in numbers and at speed – as they did so impressively last season – survives their introduction to the top flight they could have a significant impact. Surprise of the season: The fixture list has handed Bournemouth a chance of glory, with their first four home games – against Aston Villa, Leicester, Sunderland and Watford – giving them an opportunity to get significant points on the board against likely relegation candidates before the clocks go back. Player of the season: Eden Hazard and Sergio Agüero remain the best teams’ best players, and will stylishly jostle each other for individual supremacy. Which is another way of saying it’s very hard to pick between about 10 possible candidates but if forced I’ll go with Leicester, Norwich and, unless Christian Benteke is replaced by someone equally golden-booted, Aston Villa. Relegated: Unlike last season all three promoted clubs have the potential to thrive, which hopefully will lead to a closely contested relegation scrap that will never see one side marooned on the bottom. In short they weren’t just the best team in the division – they were the best two teams in the division, and despite a lack of summer signings whichever one turns up this time must be favourites once again. Title winners: Last season Chelsea were unparalleled in attack until mid-January, and unbeatable in defence thereafter. Photograph: JMP/REX Shutterstock Simon Burnton Watford’s striker Troy Deeney is capable of thriving in the Premier League. Although whatever it is that’s about to happen at Manchester United – disaster, triumph, glory, nervous collapse – should be fun to watch. People in the media pretending to care about handshakes, mind games, etc. Least excited about: Managers going on about stuff. Young player of the season: Memphis Depay. Stoke – now even more Barcelona than Barcelona- may be this season’s Southampton. Surprise of the season: The Premier League doesn’t do surprises. Player of the season: Harry Kane, who everyone seems to think is going to struggle, lose his mojo and all the rest but who is in fact an irrepressible cartoon-style hero and will score 30 goals this season while having more fun than any other human being on the planet. Relegated: Watford and Norwich, just because they go up and they go down. Mainly though, nobody else looks that good. Raheem Sterling is £49m of quite good but he’s just the right signing for a team who needed speed, vim and youth. David Silva is still the best David Silva-style player around. Vincent Kompany and Yaya Touré have to be better than last season. Still have the strongest squad in all areas. Photograph: John Marsh/Reuters Barney Ronay Raheem Sterling will hope to match the expectations generated by his £49m move to Manchester City.
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