Premier League Matchweek 26 was a beauty, and it may well have seen the title race cross a point of no return in favor of Liverpool.
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But this wasn’t just abiout the Reds dealing out a loss to old rivals Man City in fairly decisive fashion, as there were failures found all over the top half of the table.
Arsenal fell to West Ham and Bournemouth slipped up at home to Wolves, while Newcastle and Aston Villa both claimed wins over fellow top-four hopefuls.
Here are all the scores from this weekend, as well as the biggest talking points from the 10 games around England.
Premier League fixtures, results Matchweek 26
Friday 21 February 2025
Leicester City 0-4 Brentford — Highlights, recap & analysis
Saturday 22 February 2025
Everton 2-2 Man Utd — Highlights, recap & analysis
AFC Bournemouth 0-1 Wolves — Highlights, recap & analysis
Arsenal 0-1 West Ham — Highlights, recap & analysis
Fulham 0-2 Crystal Palace — Highlights, recap & analysis
Ipswich Town 1-4 Spurs — Highlights, recap & analysis
Southampton 0-4 Brighton — Highlights, recap & analysis
Aston Villa 2-1 Chelsea — Highlights, recap & analysis
Sunday 23 February 2025
Newcastle United 4-3 Nottingham Forest — Highlights, recap & analysis
Man City 0-2 Liverpool — Highlights, recap & analysis
Premier League Week 26 — What we learned
Van Dijk, Salah lead at both ends for Liverpool
Liverpool have a new boss on the sidelines this season in Arne Slot but it’s the bosses at both ends of the pitch who are driving this title fight. Virgil van Dijk and Mohamed Salah were simply sensational and the reason that the Reds took down Man City on Sunday (Well, Liverpool’s reason — Erling Haaland’s absence definitely helped). Salah is having one of the best attacking seasons in Premier League history, and Sunday found him influential in how he helped teammate Trent Alexander-Arnold when the right back was in trouble on their shared side. Then there’s Van Dijk, who at one point was even directing Liverpool goalkeeper Alisson Becker — no spring chicken — on the pitch. The Dutch defender was phenomenal, aerially dominant with eight headed clearances amongst his game-high 17 defensive actions. — Nick Mendola
City’s over-reliance on Haaland clear to see
This wasn’t a terrible performance from City. They had close to 70 percent possession, dominated large portions of the game and easily outshot Liverpool. But with Erling Haaland out injured they never looked like turning their territorial dominance into goals. Jeremy Doku had the beating of Trent Alexander-Arnold time and time again and whipped in several crosses to the near post but nobody was there for City in Haaland’s usual spot. For so often the question about Haaland at City has been ‘But how will he fit into their system and team?’ Now it’s, ‘How can City make it work when he’s not in the team?’ City have adapted to Haaland’s strengths and on Sunday they missed their focal point, their talisman, their predator in the box. So much of their play now revolves around Haaland’s movement, playing off him and then cutting balls back for him to bully defenders and finish. Omar Marmoush and Phil Foden played as false nines in lieu of Haaland and both had their moments. Foden teed up Marmoush to finish in the first half but he was just offside. But that was as good as it got. Pace, trickery, and creativity only gets you so far against the likes of Virgil van Dijk and Ibrahima Konate. The brute strength of Haaland was missed massively. That is now going to be the case each time he’s missing in the coming years as City are built around Haaland and have no like-for-like replacement when he’s out. That has to change. — Joe Prince-Wright
Arsenal team teems with disappointment
It feels like piling-on at times, but if we’re going to praise Arsenal’s long, continuous ascent under Mikel Arteta then we have to note when they flop while trying to get to the next level. Saturday’s 1-0 loss to West Ham just had to be three points for the Gunners, at home to the Irons. Yes, even with the injuries to Bukayo Saka, Kai Havertz, and Gabriel Jesus. Yes, even though they were surprised by Graham Potter’s defensive set-up. Why? Because this was supposed to be a title-chasing team. What threatens to weigh on this team is that in addition to their on-field failures and the injury luck, they were not backed in January despite the clear need for a forward. This should be a wide-open Premier League title race with Man City, Chelsea, Man United, and Tottenham Hotspur off their games and Liverpool doing well but far from a juggernaut. What Arteta wouldn’t give to say that his team was playing incredibly well but just couldn’t catch a powerhouse, because right now he’s leading a huge disappointment and it looks like he’ll need a UEFA Champions League final to call this season any sort of step forward. — Nick Mendola
Spurs get stronger as game goes on
Oh, how nice it must be for Ange Postecoglou to have a bench full of senior players that he can actually bring in the second half — and Spurs sure did need their injection of energy and quality to see this one out. Maybe more so than most managers, the ability to make five substitutions is a true game-changer given the intensity with which Postecoglou’s team plays. Destiny Udogie and Brennan Johnson both made their first starts since returning from injury and looked nearly out on their feet after an hour. So Postecoglou took them off because he could. All that subs James Maddison and Dane Scarlett did was provide an assist each for the late goals that put the game to bed. The knock-on effect is that half of the starting XI will be fresher when it’s time to go again on Wednesday — a simple luxury that Spurs were without for half of the season. — Andy Edwards
Newcastle, Forest ‘get it’ as top-four hunger on display
We’ve said it many times this season and Sunday’s seven-goal fantasy at St. James’ Park was a tremendous illustration of the opportunities available to so many Premier League teams with a top-four picture not even close to decided as the campaign his the final dozen or so games. The gap between 10th and fourth place is just five points and third-place Forest is just three points above that mess. Only two spots are close to settled and all of this is happening with traditional powers Tottenham Hotspur and Manchester United not even sniffing the top-seven picture. Both Newcastle and Forest showed urgency coming off losses, and it’s easy to see that top-four nerves (Newcastle) and hunger (Forest) were front-of-mind as the Tricky Trees did anything but shrink into the shadows and prepare to fight another day. These three points may be those that keep one side over another, and the season sweep by Newcastle is massive to their season hopes. With 10 teams fighting for 4-5 spots, expect a lot more matches with these implications. And if both sides show up with the sort of fire we saw Sunday, then tune into all of those fixtures. — Nick Mendola
