1.
City and Liverpool are a cut above the rest and it's hard to imagine a situation in which they don't make top 4. Not much to say about them, City are clearly the favorites, but it's unlikely that they'll take the league by storm like last season, and a much improved Liverpool could give them a run for their money.
Below them,
Tottenham seems like a safe bet although as always there will be questions about the lack of improvements to the squad, particularly in midfield. What's Spurs midfield duo supposed to look like this season? A selection of Dier, Sissoko, injury prone Wanyama and Winks, and an aging Dembelé doesn't inspire much confidence. Some reports suggest Alli will play a deeper role this season, so his ability to perform there will be key.
Finally there's Chelsea, Manchester United and Arsenal, which all seem hard to evaluate from a pre-season standpoint. Arsenal and Chelsea might take time to adjust to their new coaches, while Manchester United are coming off a poor season in which they owed much to De Gea's magic, and with Mourinho's track record in 3rd seasons, a disaster might be in the cards. My gut says it will be
Chelsea (if they don't end up losing Courtois or another important player before the window closes) the one to make top4 this season. They have a talented squad with few (if any) worrying spots, and there's serious concerns about both Arsenal and Manchester United.
2. New format is a bit unfair to France, with Ligue 1 having improved a lot the last few seasons and their new TV deal putting them at the same level as the other top european leagues in terms of revenue. Not much to say other than that, the top leagues are so dominant that UEFA is forced to cater to them.
3. Predicting the Champions League winner is a crapshoot, and with the uncertainty around teams like Bayern and Madrid it's even harder to predict. I feel like this might finally be the year for English teams.
4. There's no doubt Kanté and Jorginho will start. The third midfielder will likely be Fabregas, though given his age and the emergence of Loftus-Cheek they'll probably end up sharing minutes depending on their performance.
I still think anything from 30m to 40m is overpaying for Richarlison. At the end, he's still Silva pet player and he only performed under him. Everton is still a bad managed club when they are still trying to sell Lookman for less than 25M.
Liverpool is out there trying to sell Ings for 20M and Origi for 27M. Hyped for the season. Hope this can be a better season for us, Liverpool fans.
30m for Richarlison is a really good price, if you think otherwise then you have no clue how transfers work I'm sorry. Young players are always more expensive, and you need to consider a club like Everton has a harder time attracting players than other clubs. If they'd waited a year to sign Richarlison it's likely that stronger teams would have been in competition for him. They need to take these risks. That being said, yes, 40m (how much was it in the end?? each source says a different thing) is a bit of an overpay.
In any case, every time you see a transfer you shouldn't just look at the transfer fee. Wages are usually a bigger factor, and the age of a player is too. If Richarlison ends up staying 7 years at Everton (or they sell him for more) then his transfer fee will look like a bargain.
And I have no idea where this narrative that
''Everton is trying to sell Lookman'' comes from. They are NOT trying to sell Lookman, its clearly the opposite, they're trying to keep him, but he's trying to force his way out. In any case, even if he ends up leaving, don't forget that Everton signed him just 1 year ago for a low fee, so they'll still profit a lot from the operation.