Five Knee-Jerk Reactions as the Premier League 2026-27 Returns Analyst

After an eventful first weekend ofPremier Leaguefootball following three weeks off, we sum up the action with five hastily made conclusions. Following the international break, we're back with our weekly round-up of the Premier League action with a dose of knee-jerk reactions.

Usually, we take our time and use big data sets to come to our conclusions, but here, we only need a single round of matches to make our minds up. Sometimes these prove to be no more than knee-jerk reactions, but there are times when a slightly deeper delve into the numbers suggests that there might actually be some truth to them.

Read on to see what you make of this week's takeaways. Red Cards Don't Matter Any More Are Premier League players now so fit that they are equipped to deal with the challenge of having a man sent off?

The evidence of Saturday (though very muchnotSunday) suggests that's one possibility. First, Brighton were reduced to 10 men when Pascal Struijk was dismissed just 12 minutes into the second half at Sunderland, but still went on to win.

Fabian Hürzeler's men managed the game exceptionally well and, despite being at a one-man disadvantage, kept their opponents at arm's length. They 'won' the period in which they were playing with 10 men by a goal to nil and wrapped up a 2-0 victory.

Then, in the late kick-off, Spurs had Rodrigo Bentancur sent off when they were a goal down at Manchester United. They seized the initiative, though, and eventually found a well-deserved equaliser when Dominic Solanke headed in late on.

They were so superior during that period that it appeared as though it was United who'd had the man sent off. Modern tactical systems are so meticulously planned that, in normal circumstances, any space that opens up can be exploited ruthlessly.

But in these two games, it was the team a man down who thrived. Sunderland and United clearly didn't like having the impetus on them to go out and grab the game.

This probably isn't a sign of the times, though. Other than those two games, City at United is the only other example of a team going down to 10 men and avoiding defeat in the Premier League this season; the other six have all lost.