Premier League set to return amid Man City verdict fallout: record draw rate as Wales and England women lead play-off first legs

The Premier League is about to restart after the international break, and it brings back more than a table: the fallout from the verdict over Manchester City's long-running alleged breaches is making 'whether this year counts as real' one of English football's sharpest questions. At the same time, the data offers another warning: this season's Premier League is creating more chances but scoring fewer goals, and the draw rate is already the highest in history. On the international front, Wales and England women both took first-leg leads in their World Cup play-offs, while developments around Liverpool and FIFA show that club and governance stories are moving too.

Manchester City verdict fallout: when 'real' itself becomes the issue

In Barney Ronay's column, the English top flight returns with a heavy realisation: its serial champions have been accused of authoring a 10-year 'sham supremacy'^[4]. The piece sums up the starting point as a simple question - 'How is it going to feel?' - and stresses that there is no precedent, because Manchester City continue to maintain their complete innocence and deny all charges. Ronay also describes City's appeal defence as 'based around the government giving them money', arguing this is close to an admission that the club is a propaganda tool of an overseas state, and jokes that the UAE shirt might as well have six stars, one for each title. In his view, Abu Dhabi's shaping of the Premier League from 2009 to 2018 was like the Yas Marina circuit - only a stage set was visible. So the real question is no longer 'Who will win the title?' but 'What is real now?'

The Premier League in numbers: 2.70 goals against 2.88 xG

The 2026-27 Premier League season is averaging 2.70 non-penalty goals per game, higher than last season and two of the previous four campaigns; but non-penalty expected goals per game stand at 2.88, the second-highest in the past six seasons^[5]. In other words, if all 20 teams converted chances at a normal rate, there would be almost two extra goals every week. One consequence of the waste is that the draw rate this season is higher than in any previous Premier League campaign - some games that should have been settled have been dragged into draws. The problem is not isolated: 14 clubs have scored fewer goals than expected, up from 10 last season; across the first five match weeks there were 24 instances of a team scoring at least one goal fewer than its xG, twice as many as in the opening 50 games of last season. Chance quality does not appear to be the reason: teams are averaging 24.8 touches in the box, only 0.6 fewer than last season; but broken down, four of last season's top five are seeing their box touches decline, and Aston Villa and Liverpool are down by about a third on their averages. The only riser is Manchester United, but they have faced only one team that finished in last season's top 10, and five of their eight goals came against Ipswich, the Championship runners-up. United lead the league in non-penalty shots, yet their expected goals per shot is joint second-lowest; Mbeumo is one of 10 players who have underperformed by at least one goal, having also underperformed by 1.19 goals last season.

World Cup play-off: Wales lead after 1-0 win away to Albania

In the first leg of their World Cup play-off semi-final in Shkoder, Wales beat Albania 1-0 to take the lead in the two-legged tie^[1]. The BBC highlights for the match run 3 minutes 15 seconds, and the same page also gathers several related items, from older national-team videos such as 'Davies dreams of World Cup after missing Euros' and 'Wales 6-1 Montenegro' to video titles including Maresca saying he 'completely trusts' Manchester City, Holloway calling for City to be expelled from the league, and Odegaard saying the defeat to City drove Arsenal to the title^[1]. Those titles echo the Manchester City verdict saga, showing the topic is still dominating English football's conversation. For Wales, the 1-0 away score means the second leg remains open, but they have put themselves in a stronger position.

Women's World Cup play-off: England 3-1 Greece, Le Tissier scores first international goal

On Friday night in Crete, Sarina Wiegman's England women beat Greece 3-1 to take the advantage in the first leg of their play-off, with the second leg to be played in Leicester on Tuesday (19:30 BST)^[2]. As back-to-back European champions, England finished only second in their qualifying group and therefore had to go through the play-offs; the winner of the tie will face Ukraine or Slovakia in round two to decide who goes to Brazil. Lucy Bronze withdrew from the squad early with a minor injury, giving Manchester United captain Maya Le Tissier a chance: she won her 15th cap and scored her first international goal in the 63rd minute^[2]. Wiegman said afterwards that Le Tissier was higher up the pitch when the team had possession, and that she had already created danger with a few crosses. It was also England's third win in their past eight away competitive matches; Wiegman was unhappy not to keep a clean sheet, with Greece's Papatheodorou hitting the crossbar in the first half and then assisting Brookseal's goal. Wiegman also handed debuts to 18-year-old Parkinson and 28-year-old Liverpool captain Fisk, the latter more than six years after her first call-up in 2020.

Liverpool latest: the No 29 shirt and a video game character

In the latest Liverpool news, Barcola spoke about the origins of his No 29 shirt - the number was inspired by a video game character^[3]. Shirt numbers in the Premier League are often given personal narratives, from remembering family to honouring idols, and now games and popular culture have become another source for players choosing their numbers.

FIFA: Infantino's path to re-election almost wide open

With 40 days until the 18 November nomination deadline, senior figures in world football now widely believe that 56-year-old Infantino is likely to be re-elected unopposed^[6]. That judgment would have been almost unimaginable two months ago: at the time, his push for the FIFA Forward Enterprise (FFE) plan - selling World Cup commercial rights to a private equity firm - gave UEFA a chance to 'cut off the head', but Infantino's support outside Europe thwarted that calculation. Since convening management in Rabat on 5 August to discuss FFE, his travels have covered the inauguration of Colombia's new president, a FIFA-funded youth tournament in the Dominican Republic, the Asean Federation Cup final in Jakarta and an African football conference in Cape Verde. The split in world football is clear: UEFA, Concacaf and the AFC are against him, while Africa, South America and Oceania support him. In Cape Verde he said 'we have invested 1 billion dollars in Africa over ten years', and 54 African countries this year pledged unconditional support for the third time; UEFA wanted a president who is 'respected, can unite everyone and is deeply rooted in football', but failed to put forward its own candidate, and Montagliani chose to continue as Concacaf president. If there is no challenger, the Rabat congress on 18 March next year will be just another coronation.

What to watch next

These threads point to the same window: the international break ends and the Premier League kicks off again. At league level, the most important thing to track is whether conversion rates return - of the 14 clubs scoring below expectation, eight are only about one goal away from their underlying numbers, and once the finishing comes back, the table could be rewritten quickly; Manchester United's contrast of 'most shots, worst shot quality' is one of the most intriguing data points of the round^[5]. In the public debate, the fallout from the Manchester City verdict will not disappear when the whistle blows, and the question of 'what is real' will still hang over every round of broadcasts^[4]. At international level, England women must guard against a Greek comeback in Leicester on Tuesday, with the first-leg goal conceded keeping the tie alive; Wales's 1-0 is likewise only a half-time lead^[1][2]. At governance level, the 18 November nomination deadline and the Rabat congress on 18 March next year will decide FIFA's power structure for the next four years^[6].