SportTalk

Arsenal

As impressive as Everton were dreadful, Arsenal players and fans will have gained plenty from their resounding victory at Goodison Park: confidence, defiance, belief in their new formation, and the reassuring cushion of three away points. There are no must-win games on the opening weekend of a season but Arsenal’s upcoming fixture list is so unusual and tricky in equal measure that anything less than victory on Merseyside would have resulted in awkward anxiety.
Arsenal has a really tough start to the season with only two home games before October. Between now and then ends September Arsenal must travel to Celtic, twice to Manchester as well as Fulham. Saturday’s win will give the players confidence for these tough games, where Arsenal needs at least three wins from four games.

Tottenham Hotspur
With Wilson Palacios running the midfield, this was a very convincing performance by Spurs. If it was not for the man the appalling finishing of Robbie Keane, Liverpool could easily have conceded four or five goals. It is easy to get carried away with one victory, but on this weekend’s evidence the only question to be asked is where Spurs will finish in the top six.

Mark Hughes
Has the most pressure of any manager in the Premier League, but got a badly needed victory at Blackburn. With Wolves and Portsmouth in their next two games, City have a chance to be top of the table at the end of the month.

Wayne Rooney
Nobody knows better than Rooney what is at stake in the next ten months. “For me personally, next season could be the season that transforms me from someone who could be a great player into someone who is a great player,” he said in an interview published in July.
He has the centre-stage platform from which to make the transformation and stood out as a class apart against Birmingham. There’s a long way to go but it’s the start he wanted.

Wigan
Critics will say that they beat an Aston Villa side weakened by the departure of Gareth Barry and retirement of Martin Laursen. Consider then that since the start of the year, Wigan have been sold Antonio Valencia, Wilson Palacios, Emile Heskey and, most recently, Lee Cattermole

Sunderland
Thus was a huge win for a team looking mid-table stability this season. Darren Bent, with a point to prove and a England squad berth to claim, should be a success alongside Kenwyne Jones and has already repaid a chunk of his transfer fee with the winner at Bolton. Sunderland play Chelsea in midweek, bit after that they play Blackburn, Stoke, Hull, Burnley and Wolves, which are all winnable games.