The Teams That Could Break Into the Premier League Top Six This Season

 Moise Kean, Ayoze Perez, Jesus Vallejo and Jack Wilshere are all aiming for the top six. Composite: Everton via Getty; Getty; Offside/Getty; AMA/Getty
Moise Kean, Ayoze Perez, Jesus Vallejo and Jack Wilshere are all aiming for the top six. Composite: Everton via Getty; Getty; Offside/Getty; AMA/Getty
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The Teams That Could Break Into the Premier League Top Six This Season

 Moise Kean, Ayoze Perez, Jesus Vallejo and Jack Wilshere are all aiming for the top six. Composite: Everton via Getty; Getty; Offside/Getty; AMA/Getty
Moise Kean, Ayoze Perez, Jesus Vallejo and Jack Wilshere are all aiming for the top six. Composite: Everton via Getty; Getty; Offside/Getty; AMA/Getty

The same teams have taken the top six places in the Premier League for the last three seasons, but their stranglehold over the European qualifying spots may be broken in 2019-20. The challenging pack showed last season that they are getting closer. The gap from Chelsea in third down to West Ham in tenth was just 20 points – as small as it has been in the last 12 years, and 13 points fewer than it was the season before.

And that’s despite the fact Everton, Leicester and West Ham had fairly disappointing campaigns. Those three clubs – as well as Wolves, who were the closest challengers to the top six last season – have all strengthened this summer and will feel as if they have an opportunity to bridge the narrowing gap.

Wolves
Wolves finished seventh last season, just four points behind Manchester United, which gave the club a taste of European football for the first time in 39 years. The extra fixtures are already piling up. They played their first competitive game of the season in July against Northern Irish side Crusaders in a Europa League qualifier. They won that two-legged tie and now face Armenian side Pyunik for a chance to play either Torino or Shakhtyor Soligors in the final round of qualifying before the group stage begins in September.

Given the extra workload, Wolves were surprisingly slow in the transfer market this summer. Leander Dendoncker and Raúl Jiménez have both made their loan moves permanent (and, at £30m, the deal for Jiménez is a new transfer record for the club) , but those deals were already agreed. The first new face through the door, Jesús Vallejo, joined the club a couple of days after they had played their first game of the season in Belfast in the Europa League.

Even though he is only initially joining on a season-long loan, Vallejo should prove to be worth the wait. The 22-year-old Real Madrid centre-back captained Spain to glory at the U21 European Championship earlier this summer. He has not yet made a big impact at the Bernabéu but he should be considered a significant upgrade on Ryan Bennett.

Wolves have also signed young Italian striker Patrick Cutrone from Milan for £20m. He is another hot prospect who went off the boil last season. Still just 21, Cutrone scored 10 goals for Milan in just 1,512 minutes in Serie A in the 2017-18 season, but managed just three last season, the last of which came at the start of December. The Italian could prove a real coup but, unlike Vallejo, he may have to settle for a spot on the bench initially, given the rapport Jiménez and Diogo Jota built last season. Crucially, though, he gives Nuno more scope to rotate his squad.

Everton
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Everton have enjoyed a more productive summer, though there will be greater pressure and expectation on the team and coach Marco Silva as a result. They have lost a star man in Idrissa Gueye, who joined PSG for £29m. Gueye’s replacement, Jean-Philippe Gbamin – who joined from Mainz for around £22.5m – is six years younger and has a lot of catching up to do to fill his boots. Gbamin isn’t particularly strong in possession for a holding midfielder, boasting a meagre 80.4% pass accuracy, and does not come close to Gueye when it comes to breaking up play.

The club signed André Gomes on a permanent deal for £22m after being impressed by his loan spell last season. Fabian Delph should prove to a be another very shrewd addition at just £8.5m – an absolute bargain fee in this market. He’s a leader on and off the pitch and a potential driving force from deep now that he is back in his favoured midfield position.

However, their most interesting new arrival is that of Moise Kean, who joins from Juventus on a permanent transfer for £29m even though he finished last season in superb form for the Italian champions. The teenager scored more frequently in Serie A (every 89 minutes) than any other player last season, earning himself a call-up to the Italy team, where he has leapfrogged the aforementioned Cutrone in the pecking order. When he made his full international debut earlier this year he became the youngest forward to start a game for Italy since Edoardo Mariani in 1912.

There is plenty of pressure on Kean’s young shoulders given Everton’s lack of goals last season. A starting striker only found the net in seven of their 38 league games last season. If Kean makes the desired impact, Everton should be a force.

Leicester City are also expecting to make great strides this season, with Brendan Rodgers’ influence on the team now in full effect. They managed to retain the services of young Belgian midfielder Youri Tielemans – signing him permanently from Monaco for a club-record fee of £40m – despite apparent interest from Manchester United. Harry Maguire did depart for Old Trafford, but there’s real optimism around their young squad.

They have two excellent full-backs in Ricardo Pereira and Ben Chilwell and another hot prospect in new signing James Justin. His arrival from Luton for £8m could even push Pereira – the club’s player of the season for 2018/19 – into a more advanced role.

They should carry a real threat going forward. Jamie Vardy was isolated too often under Claude Puel but the addition of Ayoze Pérez – signed from Newcastle for £30m – should help solve that problem. Leicester now have a great combination of grit and guile in midfield. If Rodgers can find a capable replacement for Maguire at centre-back, Leicester will be well placed to push up the table – but it’s a big if.

West Ham

West Ham are the real dark horses for a place in the top six, but they should not be overlooked. They finished just five points behind Wolves last season and have pulled off some eye-catching transfers this summer.

Not only have they signed French striker Sébastien Haller for £45m, Spanish attacking midfielder Pablo Fornals for £24m and Swiss striker Albian Ajeti for £8m, but they also have players who can make a decisive impact returning to fitness to bolster their enviable attacking line-up. After spending large periods of last season injured, Manuel Lanzini and Andriy Yarmolenko are back in the fold to complement Felipe Anderson and Jack Wilshere, an oft-forgotten man who has shone in pre-season.

The Guardian Sport



Flawless Oscar, Max Flounders: Bahrain Grand Prix Talking Points 

McLaren driver Oscar Piastri of Australia in action during the the Formula One Bahrain Grand Prix, in Sakhir, Sunday, April 13, 2025. (AP)
McLaren driver Oscar Piastri of Australia in action during the the Formula One Bahrain Grand Prix, in Sakhir, Sunday, April 13, 2025. (AP)
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Flawless Oscar, Max Flounders: Bahrain Grand Prix Talking Points 

McLaren driver Oscar Piastri of Australia in action during the the Formula One Bahrain Grand Prix, in Sakhir, Sunday, April 13, 2025. (AP)
McLaren driver Oscar Piastri of Australia in action during the the Formula One Bahrain Grand Prix, in Sakhir, Sunday, April 13, 2025. (AP)

Oscar Piastri produced a command performance on Sunday to deliver McLaren's first win at the Bahrain Grand Prix since the nocturnal desert dust-up joined the Formula One calendar in 2004.

The Australian crossed the line in Sakhir over 15 seconds clear of Mercedes' George Russell to move second behind teammate Lando Norris in the drivers' standings.

Norris completed the podium to take a three-point lead into next Sunday's race in Jeddah.

AFP Sport looks at three talking points from the fourth round of the season:

Oscar Piastri shone brightest under the floodlights in Bahrain to enhance his standing as a potential world champion.

Cool, calm and collected, nothing seems to faze the 24-year-old Australian.

As McLaren team principal Andrea Stella succinctly remarked: "There's no noise in Oscar's head".

Brushing off the misfortune of a late run off in the season-opener in Melbourne that dropped him back from second to ninth he regrouped to win in China, take third in Japan, and win from pole in Bahrain.

"I'm very proud of the team, proud of myself, and excited for next week," he said after his fourth career win.

Piastri's persona is poles apart from that of the man on the other side of the McLaren garage, Lando Norris.

The Briton wears his heart on his sleeve, is intensely self-critical, and left Bahrain searching for answers to regain his and his car's mojo.

"I'm not confident, I'm not comfortable, I know what I can achieve, it's not gone, I've not lost it, but things aren't clicking. I've got to look at why but that's proving not to be easy."

Red Bull picked up their first double points of the season in Sakhir, with Max Verstappen sixth and his new teammate Yuki Tsunoda ninth.

But that was small consolation for a team in trouble and desperately searching for answers to solve issues with their problematic 2025 car.

Team principal Christian Horner was frank about the situation when he met the media in the team's hospitality tent after the race.

"Look, it was a bad weekend.

"It's a 24-race championship, we're eight points behind in the drivers' championship, and we know we need to make progress very quickly."

With Verstappen slipping to third in the drivers' standings his quest for a fifth successive title, a feat only achieved by Michael Schumacher, looks in danger.

"Everything went wrong, poor start, wheel spin, same problems in qualification, hard tires didn't work, I was last after the second pit stop," remarked Verstappen.

"Considering everything to finish sixth was alright.

"It's not what we want, but it's where we are at.

"It's tough, got to hang on to improve the situation -- hopefully we can improve soon," added the downbeat Dutchman.

Arguably the driver of the day was George Russell.

His Mercedes was doing everything it could in the closing stages to sabotage his race.

He found himself having to multi-task at high speed trying to sort out a litany of electronic issues -- at one stage he pressed the team radio button only to engage DRS (drag reduction system).

All that as he was fending off Norris.

After surviving a steward's inquiry over the DRS incident which carried with it the threat of a five-second penalty Russell's runner-up spot maintained his best ever start to a season with his third podium finish.

"I'm mega happy, the last 10 laps were exceptionally difficult," said the man who has seamlessly taken over the role of team leader at the Silver Arrows after Lewis Hamilton's move to Ferrari.

Hamilton's replacement Kimi Antonelli was going well until undone by the late safety car to finish just outside the points in a race which will serve as a valuable learning exercise for the brilliant young Italian rookie.