In Today’s CleanSheet:

• Headlines 📌

• What 2 Look 4 👀 - this weeks match-ups

• Hot Topic 🔥🔥🔥

• Off Island 🏝️ - Area’s of interest outside the PL

• Best Bets 💰- Predictions & Results

Headlines 📌

• Pencil This One In. Liverpool at Newcastle United Sunday 1030am cst on USA Network. Two teams fighting for a title and top 4 finish. NU was disappointing in a 0-1 loss at City, showing their weaknesses. Last home match they ran Villa off the pitch in the second half. Liverpool is hard to predict, they looked lost early in their home match against Bournemouth yet won 3-1 even as they went down a man. The Reds are very capable of getting a W or D at Newcastle, and Newcastle can beat any PL team at home and could score 4 or 5 and blitz anyone, like they did Villa. Will be fun to watch.

• Pep. Drama at City as manager Pep Guardiola has unexpected back surgery and will not coach the team until they return from international break on 9/16. Nothing seems to be impacting City as they continue to roll and seem very focused on doing something no PL team has ever done, go back to back to back to back. Good news though - the two matches Pep will miss are at Sheffield United and home to Fulham. They will be significant favorites.

• Transfer window closes 9 1. It’s unique to fans of American professional teams. You rarely see professional teams continuing to trade players 3 weeks into the season, especially at this volume. The Saudi League throws another wrinkle in movement this year, and unlimited $. Here’s a good breakdown of each PL team need and transfer rumors from Joe Prince-Wright of NBC Sports.

What 2 Look 4 👀- Match Week 3

Battle of Heavyweights

• Newcastle v Liverpool (Sun) - See above.

• BHA v W Ham (Sat) - Well, “heavyweights” is an overstatement, but this is a matchup of the team at the top of the table who is scoring at will, and a good-sized London club that has looked impressive to start the season.

Early Season Relegation Positioning

• Everton v Wolves (Sat) - Does Everton manager Dyche survive a loss? What Wolves team shows up? Can Everton score?

Favorites on the Road (reminder, EPL lists home team first away team second)

• Burnley v Villa (Sun) - Just forget the opening match and pretend this is the opening match, says every Claret supporter. Who is Burnley? Can they score against Villa?

• Sheffield U v Man City(Sun) - Does missing Pep impact City? No. If this game is tied in 60^th min, then tune in (it’s not going to be).

• Bournemouth v Tottenham(Sat) - Spurs manager Postecoglou wins. The Cherries have looked (a little) better than expected, and this week brought in USMNT star Tyler Adams, but that is not to overcome their injury problems, missing 8 top team players.

Semi Interesting “Smaller” London Derby’s

• Brentford v Palace (Sat) - London Derby. Bees just keep plugging along, can Palace score?

• Arsenal v Fulham (Sat) - Should not be close. Fulham getting outplayed and that continues.

Prove It To Me

• Chelsea v Luton Town(Fri) - On paper this should be a route. If you’re not sure of the direction of the route - go read the season previews at the CleanSheet website.

• Man United v Forest(Sat) - Forest looks lost, so does Man U with a lot more talent.

Hot Topic 🔥🔥🔥

What the f is a Derby?

You may have seen the word “Derby” in these newsletters or in 1 or more of the 20 PL team season previews.

A Derby, pronounced “Dahr-bee” is a clash of “bitter” rivals, but its more than a rival, both teams need to be located near each other. Typically, the same city or connected towns. You may have bitter rivals that are not located near each other, that is not a derby. Its interesting because in leagues like the NFL the teams seem to have been set up to avoid Derby’s. Having the Jets and Giants, Angels Dodgers, Mets Yankees, Rams and Chargers, SF and Oakland in different divisions have really limited the Derby idea here. There is not a specific distance, just close. UNC Duke would be considered a Derby. Wisconsin Marquette. Indiana Purdue. Red Sox Yankees might not be close enough (and is it really a Derby when you play 20 times a year, no). Point is, in English Soccer, where there are thousands of clubs in a relatively small area, there are true rivalries that truly create significant competition/fighting amongst neighbors. 1 Min commercial that describes it pretty well.

Why the name Derby? It is not clear, but the biggest guess is that in 1780 the Earl of Derby started horse racing and called it The Derby. In 1840 the word became more of a noun to represent a local sporting contest. Hence, the location component of a rivalry.

Not every PL team’s biggest rival is in the PL this year, so the Derby will only be played if the teams meet in another competition like the FA Cup. Here are some notable “Derby’s” you will see this year in the PL.

• The North West Derby - Liverpool v Man United - Considered by many as the “biggest”. More to come on this Derby in a future release of the CleanSheet. There is a lot of bad blood between the clubs stemming from violent arguments from each city’s desire to control shipping lanes in the late 1800s.

• The North London Derby – Tottenham v Arsenal. This has produced the most goals across all “high level” Derby’s.

• Merseyside (Mersey is a river running through Liverpool) – Everton v Liverpool. Stadiums are a half mile apart. This is the third closest by distance of all the derbies.

• Manchester Derby – City v United (see commercial above).

• West London Derby - Fulham v Chelsea v Brentford - 1.4 miles apart. Any matches between these 3. Queen Park Rangers is also part of the Darby but not in the PL this year.

• A23 or M23 Derby - BHA v Palace. Some question if this is a real derby given the distance of 40 miles apart, but both stadiums are off “interstate” 23, named the A23 and M23.

Off Island 🏝️

USA USA USA. A great opening weekend for Christian Pulisic at AC Milan. 1 min watch of his assist and goal. Pulisic has now scored in 3 big leagues in Europe (German Bundesliga, Italian Serie A and English PL), no other American has done this. He seems to have new life, away from Chelsea and reunited with former teammate Oliver Giroud. Hope he can stay healthy, will be fun to watch.

Two excellent calls of his goal -

• English version - that also tells a good story of where he’s been, and what it means to his mom.

• Italian Version - Brilliant!

Best Bets 💰

Season Gains/Losses +$48, 4W 5L on picks

Everton v Wolves to DRAW +220. $20.

Everton’s season is off to a terrible start. Aside from not scoring, they just haven’t looked good. Sean Dyche is a good manager, and I expect him to make adjustments, but can they score? Maybe. Wolves also have started 0-2 but have shown signs of life, even though they ran into a buzz saw at Brighton last week. I expect a low score match, 0-0, 1-1. So taking the odds and going DRAW.

Villa to WIN +117 at Burnley. $20.

Burnley had an extra week to “rest” after being soundly beat at home to Man City. This feels like a re-start for them, and its enticing to think the home team will have the advantage. However, Villa is much better and showed that last week in dismantling Everton. Expect a Villa win 1-0 or 2-0.

Chelsea v Luton Town over 3.5 goals +125. $20.

Like Burnley, LT had an extra week of “rest”. They relied on their defense last season to make their run to the PL, but that was the Championship. Chelsea has only won 1 time in their last 14 PL matches and scored 1 goal in each of their two PL matches this year. So why will there be goals in this matchup? Chelsea is creating chances and will convert against a lesser opponent. Period. Its too early in the season for a team to benefit from rest, and another road trip for LT will result in a similar outcome as week 1. 4-0 or 3-1 win for Chelsea.

BHA to WIN -195 v West Ham. $40.

W Ham played HARD at home to beat Chelsea, very impressive effort especially after going down to 10 men. However, BHA are playing at another level, getting goals from 6 different players in 2 matches - that continues this weekend at home. This match may be “closer than the experts predict” but that means a 2-1 or 3-1 win for BHA instead of 4-0.

Brentford to WIN +101 v Palace. $20.

Not sure how Brentford is doing it, Manager Thomas Frank just knows how to coach. Palace has been playing well but not scoring a lot. Until Brentford starts to stumble, the money should go to the magic of Frank finding a way. Bee’s 2-1.