Sport

Let the games begin – Pete O’Rourke

Let the games begin – Pete O’Rourke. If we thought last season’s Premier League was unpredictable and exciting the 2016/17 campaign is set to be the most wide open in the competition’s history.

With six teams at 10/1 or shorter to win the title the bookies do not know where the destination of the Premier League title will be this year and last season’s champions Leicester are not even included in those six fancied sides.

The Premier League looks hard to call and it seems this will be a difficult year to win the title as the big boys look to consign the shock success of Leicester to the past.

As every summer there has been influx of expensive new faces at almost every club with more expected before the close of the transfer window.

Seven Premier League clubs will also start the season with a new manager in charge with Chelsea, Everton, Manchester City, Manchester United, Southampton, Sunderland and Watford all beginning life under new stewardship.

The arrivals of Pep Guardiola and Antonio Conte has seen the Premier League lure two of the best tacticians in world football to England and the return of Jose Mourinho to the dugout has whetted the appetite of the some of the world’s best managers locking horns.

Add Guardiola, Conte, Mourinho to the mix with Wenger, Klopp and Pochettino and the action on the touchline will be almost as exciting as the football itself on the pitch.

Mourinho’s rivalry with his new neighbour Guardiola in Manchester which started in Spain when both were in charge of Real Madrid and Barcelona respectively will be something to savour as United and City look to regain supremacy as the dominant forces in the Premier League.

Then there is the old rivalry renewed between Mourinho and Wenger and no doubts the meetings of Klopp and Mourinho in the Liverpool United clashes will see sparks fly.

Chelsea’s new boss Conte is not afraid to mix it with his rivals and he will be aiming to stamp his mark in his first foray into English football.

Manchester City are narrow favourites to take the crown come next May with Guardiola brought to the Etihad to get the best out of a sometimes under-performing star-studded squad.

Guardiola has won the league in his first season in charge at his last two clubs, Barcelona and Bayern Munich and he will be aiming to make it a treble this season having spent big to reshape City’s aging squad with exciting additions like  Ilkay Gundogan, Leroy Sane, and John Stones.

Mourinho has sprinkled some star dust onto the Manchester United line-up with the arrivals of big names and big egos in the shape of Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Paul Pogba.

Mourinho normally ensures instant success wherever he goes, but after two disappointing seasons at Old Trafford the pressure is on the Portuguese to deliver.

Arsenal missed arguably their best chance to win the title last season, but the Gunners are likely to be among the contenders again and they should be able to take advantage of any periods of transition for their rivals with new managers as Wenger prepares to celebrate 20 years in charge in North London.

Tottenham will surely be better from the experience of battling for the championship last season even though it ended up in disappointment of eventually finishing third.

Pochettino is building something special at White Hart Lane, but the demands of the Champions League could have an impact on their Premier League performances.

Liverpool are preparing for their first full season under Klopp and hopes are high on Merseyside that the Reds could be dark horses in the title race as they have no distractions of Europe to concern them with.

Chelsea are another team with no European football to contend with and Conte’s strength is making a team play like a team as illustrated with Italy at Euro 2016 and if he can do at Stamford Bridge there is no reason why they cannot repeat their title success of two seasons ago.

The winner of the title is a hard one to call, but one thing we can sure of is that this campaign has got the makings of the most drama-filled, action-packed,unpredictable seasons of all time.