With the help of the Opta supercomputer, we provide our Premier League match predictions for every match in each gameweek.
The Opta supercomputer will be with us every step of the way this season as the projection model works to provide you with data-backed predictions for all Premier League matches and season outcomes.
Of course, Manchester City will take some beating when it comes to the title race, as Pep Guardiola’s men are chasing a record-extending fifth consecutive top-flight title and are overwhelming favourites to achieve that success.
Arsenal are hoping to push Man City all the way, and while Liverpool no longer have Jürgen Klopp at the helm, Arne Slot is now guiding a squad that’s very similar to the one that threatened to be a real challenger until the final weeks of 2023-24.
And no doubt we’re in store for another highly competition UEFA Champions League qualification battle involving the likes of Aston Villa, Tottenham, Chelsea, Newcastle United and Manchester United.
At the other end of the table, Leicester City, Ipswich Town and Southampton are hoping to fare better than the previous teams to be promoted from the Championship – all three were relegated in 2023-24.
Now, all of that is a little far in the future to be given much consideration yet, but our AI-powered Opta supercomputer proved rather prescient in 2023-24 and is continuing to make predictions for every fixture this season.
Read on as Opta Analyst provides its Premier League match predictions for 2024-25, and be sure to check back here ahead of every matchday for the latest projections.
Matchday 3
The Opta supercomputer has delivered its latest selection of match predictions ahead of the next weekend of Premier League football in 2024-25.
Our predictive model has made its picks for the upcoming round of matches as the early part of the season sees the league table begin to take shape, with Arsenal, Brighton, Liverpool and Manchester City setting the pace.
After a strong season of match predictions overall last year, supporters are likely to be looking at the 2024-25 picks even more forensically. And the model enjoyed a strong round yet again with its picks in the last matchweek, correctly calling wins for Man City, Tottenham, Fulham and Arsenal.
Matchday 3 will see all 10 matches crammed in across Saturday and Sunday, before players break up for the first international break of the new campaign.
Arsenal versus Brighton looks like a cracker to get things up and running, with both teams having six points to their name from the first two matches.
That is the first of seven matches taking place on Saturday, a card which concludes with West Ham hosting Man City in what may be a tough trip to London for Pep Guardiola’s champions.
There are then three matches on Sunday, including the game of the week as Manchester United, with Erik ten Hag feeling the pressure once more after losing last week, take on rivals Liverpool at Old Trafford.
Ahead of what looks set to be an entertaining group of Premier League fixtures, let’s check out the Opta supercomputer’s match predictions.
Premier League Predictions Matchweek 3: The Quick Hits
- Liverpool are favoured over Manchester United in the biggest match of the weekend at Old Trafford, though Ten Hag’s hosts are still given a fighting chance.
- The Opta supercomputer rates Newcastle United vs Tottenham Hotspur as too close to call, but expects Chelsea to earn a second straight league win when they play Crystal Palace.
- Arsenal, Aston Villa, Brentford and Man City are all well backed to win in MD 3 by our predictive model, while Ipswich Town have a strong chance of picking up their first point of the season.
Arsenal are at home against Brighton in the Saturday early fixture and both sides enter the contest with some impressive momentum. Two straight wins with clean sheets have given the Gunners an extremely solid start to the campaign, but Brighton’s last-gasp win over Man Utd means they are also right up there with Mikel Arteta’s title contenders towards the top of the early table.
Brighton have occasionally caused Arsenal problems at the Emirates Stadium, winning three times in the last seven league trips and drawing another of the games in that sequence. But the Seagulls were more underwhelming on their travels last season, failing to win any of their seven top-flight away games against London sides, meaning they have not won in the capital since beating Arsenal in May 2023.
Bukayo Saka comes into this match in electric form. He has been involved in 17 goals in his last 19 EPL appearances for Arsenal, with 12 goals and five assists, and two of those goals created came in the matches against Wolves and Aston Villa so far this season.
He is now hoping to become the first Arsenal player since Thierry Henry in 2004-05 to assist a goal in the first three games of a Premier League season and, despite Brighton’s fine start under Fabian Hürzeler, the Opta prediction model is highly confident of a Gunners victory, with their win probability up at 66.5% going into the weekend – the highest rating given to any home team.
Brentford (52.8%) and Southampton (23.8%) both lost last week but there is much more pressure on Saints, who are desperate to get off the mark for the campaign. Unfortunately for the promoted side, the Opta supercomputer does not like their chances of victory in MD 3, partly because Brentford have impressively won seven in a row on home soil against promoted teams, scoring twice or more in every one of those victories.
The Bees also fare strongly in this head-to-head, having won their last three league games against Southampton without conceding.
Despite Ivan Toney’s absence, Brentford still have a forward showing fine form in Yoane Wissa. He has been involved in six goals in his last seven home Premier League starts for Brentford (4 goals, 2 assists). In each of the last two such matches, he has scored and assisted in the same game. He now has the chance to become the first Premier League player since Leroy Sané for Man City in 2017 to score and assist in three consecutive home appearances.
It’s still August, but Everton (35.9%) fans are likely already concerned about their team’s prospects for the season going into their key home clash with Bournemouth (37.4%), who have drawn their first two matches. The Toffees have suffered comprehensive defeats to Brighton and Tottenham so far but will hope an EFL Cup win over Doncaster Rovers can help to turn the momentum.
There are some positives for Everton, as they have won six of their seven Premier League home games against Bournemouth. The Cherries typically start campaigns slowly too, not winning any of their previous nine August fixtures in the competition. Still, our predictive model rates this match as very close to call and, at 26.7%, it is seen as the most likely clash across all 10 fixtures to finish as a draw.
Another clash that is likely to be tight sees Ipswich take on Fulham at Portman Road. While the edge is given to Fulham at a win probability of 41.1%, that still makes Kieran McKenna’s promoted team more likely than not to get off the mark for the season in this game, with their chance at 32.9% and the draw a strong candidate at 26.0%.
Ipswich have never lost consecutive home league games under McKenna and opponents Fulham, who start the match on three points, have not won two of their first three games in a Premier League season since 2008, giving some hope to the newcomers.
Aston Villa are backed to bounce back from their loss to Arsenal when they play away to Leicester City. At 51.3%, they are the second-most likely team to record an away win this week, with the Foxes given just a 24.4% chance by our predictive model.
Villa have seven points from a possible nine in their last three trips to Leicester and, since Unai Emery’s first away EPL match in charge in November 2022, only Man City (23) and Arsenal (20) have won more away games than Villa (15).
The visitors could do with Ollie Watkins recapturing his best form, as the England striker has now gone seven league appearances without a goal for Villa, his longest barren run since an eight-game run between August and October 2022 prior to Emery’s arrival.
A good start to the season for Nottingham Forest has a strong chance of continuing when they host Wolves, according to our predictive model. It’s a big game for Forest boss Nuno Espírito Santo and his star playmaker Morgan Gibbs-White, as they face their former club. Nuno has more Premier League matches in charge of Wolves (114) than anyone else for the club and is unbeaten against his old team in two matches against them, winning 1-0 with Spurs in August 2021 and drawing 2-2 with Forest in April.
Gibbs-White, meanwhile, has created six open-play chances so far in 2024-25, with only Luis Díaz creating more (seven) in the top division. Since his Premier League debut for Forest in August 2022, only five players have created more chances in open play in the competition than he has (108).
Forest will look to build on a start that has seen them take four points from a possible six and are given the edge at 45.6%, with Wolves rated at 29.0% as they look to bounce back from a humbling 6-2 loss at home to Chelsea.
Having beaten Chelsea on the opening weekend, it’s another potentially tricky away test for Man City in the Saturday early evening fixture as they travel to play West Ham, who got off the mark with a win at Crystal Palace last week.
Expectations are high for West Ham after a busy summer in the transfer market, but they have struggled to lay a glove on City over recent seasons. The reigning champions have lost just one of their last 14 away league games against West Ham, winning eight, and if they avoid defeat here it will be 10 straight visits without losing.
Erling Haaland scored a hat-trick against Ipswich last week and has netted 16 goals in 10 Premier League appearances in the month of August, while Guardiola is unbeaten in 16 matches with the Hammers, which is already a joint-record in the competition for the most games a manager has faced a specific opponent in without ever losing, shared with Sir Alex Ferguson, who has a 16-match run against Charlton Athletic.
Most streaks come to an end at some point but the Opta supercomputer is rarely tempted to go against Man City and those statistics have given it confidence to hand the visitors a 64.3% win probability this weekend.
Into Sunday’s fixtures and Chelsea are on a high after smashing six goals against Wolves, with Noni Madueke netting a hat-trick, ahead of hosting Crystal Palace.
Cole Palmer was another star of the show at Molineux with a goal and three assists, setting up all of teammate Madueke’s strikes.
Since the start of last season, Palmer has been involved in more Premier League goals (37) than any other player, with a staggering 23 goals and 14 assists. In the same timeframe, he has both scored and assisted a goal in the same Premier League game more times than any other player (6).
Our model thinks the Blues are likely to have too much firepower for Palace and rates their victory chance at 57.1%, with the visitors down at 21.4% ahead of what may prove to be a tough London derby for Oliver Glasner.
Newcastle will play Tottenham in a match between two teams with UEFA Champions League ambitions who will watch this week’s draw with frustration as they are not part of this year’s competition.
Our model struggles to pick a winner in an early battle between two top-four contenders, with Newcastle (38.7%) and Spurs (37.7%) rated almost identically. A prediction that may be made with more confidence is for this game to contain goals, as Newcastle vs Tottenham is the most played fixture in Premier League history to have never finished 0-0, an active streak that currently stands at 58 games.
There have been an astonishing 34 goals in the last seven meetings alone, a huge average of 4.9 per game. Alexander Isak has played his part in that free-scoring sequence, netting twice in both of his two EPL home games against Tottenham. He could become the first player since 1996 and only the third in competition history (after Alan Shearer and Chris Sutton) to score 2+ goals in three consecutive home appearances against a club in the competition.
Stakes are high in the final match of the week as Man Utd host Liverpool, who have a 100% record so far under Arne Slot. The game will see Virgil van Dijk make his 200th league appearance for the Reds.
While United enjoyed a famous FA Cup victory over Liverpool at Old Trafford last season, they have struggled in the recent league clashes, with just one win from their last 12 top-flight meetings with Liverpool.
Only Man City (9) have won away at Old Trafford more often than Liverpool (7) in the competition’s history and Mohamed Salah tends to enjoy the fixture – he is the highest scoring visiting player to Old Trafford in Premier League history (six goals) and has nine goals in his last six games at the venue once the statistic is extended to all competitions.
United fans will hope the match breathes some life into Marcus Rashford, who usually loves facing Liverpool at Old Trafford. He has scored seven times against them in his career, with all those goals coming in home games.
Despite United’s home advantage, the Opta supercomputer gives Liverpool a strong edge for this one, with their win probability being 48.4% and Man Utd quite far behind but not completely ruled out at 28.2%. United would desperately love to pick up a morale-boosting victory, although following their loss at Brighton and recent history in the fixture, our system suggests they go in as underdogs so a draw (23.4%) is a potentially acceptable outcome for Ten Hag.
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