DAN BILICKI
Toronto Sun
It’s official: Watford is the now the lone winless team in the Premier League.
The Hornets fell 2-0 to the other remaining winless team heading into the weekend, Wolverhampton, in a matchup of two of the surprise squads from last season.
In 2018-19, Wolves finished seventh in the table in their first season back from the second tier while Watford finished 11th while reaching the FA Cup final, only to get destroyed by Manchester City.
This season, Wolverhampton has struggled in the league while its thin squad has been stretched thanks to the added Europa League duties.
The Hornets, on the other hand, don’t have an excuse for their poor play through the first two months of the season.
The fixtures haven’t been incredibly difficult, having faced two of the Big Six clubs in seven games and even taking a point from Arsenal. But after Wolves’ win on Saturday and Brighton’s 3-0 victory in the season-opener, that’s two clubs whose lone win is against Watford.
The defence has been atrocious, allowing 20 goals in seven games, which four more than any other team. Even taking away the eight conceded against City, it’s still incredibly concerning. To make matters worse, when you look at the Hornets defence analytically, it has the worst xGA (expected goals against) in the league and is actually performing worse than that.
The attack isn’t keeping up its end of the bargain, either. With just four goals, Watford is tied for the worst scoring output in the league despite ranking in the middle of the pack in the xG (expected goals) metric. In fact, Watford has the biggest difference in xG to goals scored.
With the exception of maybe Will Hughes, the entire team has been grossly underperforming. Gerard Deulofeu was tipped for a breakout season, but yet again has fallen short of his potential. Fullback Jose Holebas has been particularly bad, sitting at zero fantasy points despite starting six of seven games and playing 527 minutes.
The team has already changed its manager, too, parting ways with Javi Gracia and giving the keys back to Quique Sanchez Flores, the man who got them promoted four years ago.
What this club can do to turn things around is the big question, but it’s one that must be answered quickly.
With a home date against Sheffield United this coming weekend, there’s no time like the present. But that’s certainly no gimme.
PLAYER OF THE WEEK
I think it’s about time we talk about just how good Jamie Vardy has been since Leicester City came up to the Premier League in 2014.
His two goals this week in the Foxes blowout win over Newcastle put the English striker at 85 for his career in the top-tier. That’s one more than a fellow named Cristiano Ronaldo had during his Premier League career – and Vardy reached that total in 183 games compared to Ronaldo’s 196.
That’s 0.46 goals per game for Vardy, which is a better ratio than six of the top 10 all-time Premier League and on par with Michael Owen. Only lofty names like Alan Shearer, Thierry Henry and Sergio Aguero (whose 0.7 goals per game is tops) are better than Vardy.
Not too shabby for a guy who was playing fifth-tier football at age 24 in 2011.
AROUND THE LEAGUE
VAR  saved Arsenal from one of worst called offside we’ve ever seen. Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang was a good two yards onside when he received the pass off of a turnover. Not sure how the linesman raised his flag on that one … Wondering how Gunners manager Unai Emery is faring compared to Arsene Wenger during the Frenchman’s fraught final time with the club? Emery has been only marginally better in his first 44 games in charge of Arsenal than Wenger was in his last 44. Emery has 81 points from those contests, Wenger had 78 … West Ham is in deep trouble with goalkeeper Lukasz Fabianski out up to three months with thigh injury. The Irons have the second-worst xGA ahead of only Watford and with an inferior keeper between the sticks, they won’t get bailed out as much … Good news on the injured keeper front: Alisson is back in training with Liverpool, but it’s uncertain if he’ll play before next week’s international break … Isaac Hayden’s red card was about as textbook as they come and doomed an already wayward Newcastle side. Manager Steve Bruce even cancelled practice on Monday because he was so furious with the club. But we’re not sure that less training in the answer for this side … David Silva won his 200th game with Manchester City and set a record in doing so. The Spaniard reached the milestone quicker than anybody before him, at just 289 appearances. That one-ups John Terry’s 305 games … Think that Everton misses Idrissa Gueye? The Senegalese defensive midfield dynamo has been outstanding for PSG – which has won all six games he has played in and haven’t conceded a goal with him on the pitch. The Toffees, on the other hand, are sitting 15th in the table and have allowed the fifth-most goals … Mason Greenwood has more goals from open play in the past week than Marcus Rashford does in almost six months. That should sum up United’s attacking choices fairly well.
THE CUP RUNNETH OVER
The magic of the Cup was in full force last week.
Four Premier League clubs saw their Carabao Cup hopes dashed by lower-league clubs last week in just the third round of the competition.
Most shocking was seeing Tottenham beaten by Colchester United, a side that plys its trade in League Two, where it sits in eighth place.
Spurs’ London rivals West Ham United did much worse, losing 4-0 to Oxford United. This is actually the third year in a row that the Irons have been knocked out of a Cup competition by a League One side.
Bournemouth was also beaten by Burton Albion 2-0 and Sunderland – remember them? – beat Sheffield United. In fact, Sunderland, after taking out Burnley last round, has beaten two EPL sides before October for the first time since 2009. Pretty remarkable when you consider the team was playing in the EPL most of those years.
Manchester United also needed penalty kicks to take down lowly Rochdale.
It’s truly great to see these smaller sides take their shot and actually knockout some of the biggest teams in England.
In the next round, there a couple of bangers: Chelsea-Man U and Liverpool-Arsenal.