The most popular soccer league in the world began its season on Saturday and, along with the excitement and exhilaration about the games themselves — not to mention the sheer wonderment over the eye-crossing suit golfer Rory McIlroy chose to wear while parading his British Open trophy around Old Trafford in Manchester — there was also a fair bit of hand-wringing from many longtime observers of the Premier League.
The concerns were twofold. First, with another transfer period nearing its conclusion, the shifting of the game’s truly elite stars away from England appears to have continued. Now that Luis Suarez will be attacking defenses in Spain — but not feasting on them, presumably — it is not a stretch to posit that none of the top 10 players in the world are currently playing in England.
That is compounded by the fact that there are also not a lot of English players playing in the Premier League, or at least not playing very much. With foreign players omnipresent at many clubs — Manchester City had a starting lineup of all foreigners in the Community Shield last week — another round of concern over the paucity of English players getting regular minutes has cropped up.
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Last season, only about 30 percent of starters in the Premier League were eligible to play for England. Snarky fans, who surely watched their side stumble the the FIFA World Cup, are often quick to point out that these two concerns — that is, a lack of the best players and a lack of English players — are not connected.
Nonetheless, there can be no disputing that one thing the Premier League does have plenty of is drama surrounding its managers. Part of this is cultural: Unlike in sports in the US, players in England, and most European countries, do not face much accountability to the news media and fans during the season.
There are no hard questions for players to answer after games, and there are few public explanations given when a player has made a costly mistake. The managers, in many ways, are the only ones with a voice. And most do not hesitate to speak.
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Consider what has happened in just the first week.
Jose Mourinho, Chelsea’s manager, who brands himself the “special one,” began the season by saying that other coaches in the Premier League do not face the same pressure to succeed that he does.
In Mourinho’s opinion, other coaches “have 10 years to win something; I have only two.”
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That seemed to be a not-so-veiled shot at Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger, who last won the Premier League title in 2004, and whom Mourinho previously described as a “specialist in failure.”
Wenger, for his part, was displeased that his team was even playing at all.
With the World Cup final having been played on July 13, the Premier League having its opening day on Aug. 16 was at least a week too early, Wenger said.
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Mesut Ozil, Per Mertesacker and Lukas Podolski, who all played for World Cup champions Germany, did not play for Arsenal on Saturday as the Gunners beat Crystal Palace, 2-1.
“Let’s not forget that the guy who goes to the World Cup final plays seven games,” Wenger said. “They need a breather.”
Up in northern England, Louis van Gaal wasted no time getting involved in the Premier League managers’ showcase. Van Gaal, who left his job as manager of the Netherlands’ national team to take over at Manchester United, seems well aware that Alex Ferguson left a strong history of colorful leadership — one that the dullish David Moyes could not fill — and Van Gaal has not hesitated to embrace it.
This was to be expected. Van Gaal has never been shy or particularly modest. It has been said that he once dropped his pants in front of his players while coaching at Bayern Munich, as a way to demonstrate that he had — literally — the guts to bench any player on the team.
Since arriving at Old Trafford, Van Gaal has not resorted to such measures, though he did immediately make clear his intent to be a micromanager, dictating that his players speak only English while on the field, and making no secret of his intention to monitor what the players do even when they are not taking part in team activities.
“There are many rules the players have to fulfill outside the pitch,” Van Gaal said.
Ostensibly, Van Gaal’s methods will lead to better results for Manchester United, though not, apparently, immediately.
Swansea on Saturday spoiled Van Gaal’s first game with the team, beating the Red Devils, 2-1.
Van Gaal — of course — spoke after the loss, and he was duly morose in his comments, saying the team’s confidence was “smashed” and that “it cannot be worse.”
However, for all his woe, Van Gaal’s difficult debut was not the most notable managerial storyline of the weekend. That belonged to Tony Pulis, who was named manager of the year last season after leading Crystal Palace out of what looked to be near-certain relegation, but did not even get to defend that honor for a single match.
Pulis parted ways with Crystal Palace on Thursday — two days before the season began — after getting into a dispute with the club’s owner over team finances.
That made Pulis the first manager to be unseated this season after 13 managers were let go last season. Remember, there are only 20 teams.
One of Pulis’ assistants is filling in until a permanent replacement is named, and despite the upheaval, Crystal Palace played well enough to take an early lead against Arsenal.
The Gunners went on to overturn that deficit later in the game, but, for a little while at least, the Crystal Palace fans took the opportunity to unveil a chant that, especially in the Premier League, seemed particularly strange.
“Who needs a manager?” they sang over and over. “Who needs a manager?”
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