As the dawn of the Premier League season draws ever closer, football fans, experts and managers are all talking about the latest transfers to bolster their teams in order to win the Premier League title.
Luis Suarez, Alexis Sanchez and the entire collapse of the Southampton team have all been hot topics for this year’s season, but while most are focusing on who are going up, there is still debate to be had about who’s going down.
West Bromwich Albion tipped as fifth favourites to be relegated this season. The team were joint lowest in last season’s Premier League race with Cardiff, who unfortunately faced relegation. After winning only seven games last year, they’re on thin ice which could very soon collapse if the latest managerial changes are anything to go by.
Recently, fans were incensed by the managerial reshuffle, so much so that they were offered refunds. When Alan Irvine was assigned to step into the shoes of Pepe Mel, he suffered an extremely poor reception from fans, who wrote in letters of complaints to express their discontentment with the change.
It’s no surprise that they were unhappy with the change – Irvine has proven that he is far better accustomed to being an academy coach, and he was head coach when Sheffield Wednesday were relegated, with Preston North End not faring much better under his leadership either. In response to angry fans, the club offered refunds to all those who had written in within a week of Irvine’s appointment as head coach.
Despite West Bromwich’s indecision, they’re not the only team who could be facing the chop. Burnley, who currently have odds of 8/15 to be relegated, are the bookmakers’ favourites, ahead of Crystal Palace and the aforementioned West Bromwich Albion. Having been promoted at the end of last season, bookmakers are sceptical as to whether or not they will keep their place in the Premier League, which is largely down to their inability to attract high calibre talent.
Second favourite to be relegated are Queens Park Rangers, who may face the same fate as the aforementioned Burnley, having been promoted in May. The team’s former striker Kevin Gallen has claimed the team need “six more signings” in order to avoid relegation this season. He told The Express: “They need another two strikers because we have Bobby Zamora and Charlie Austin and that’s pretty much it.”
But with Burnley and West Bromwich potentially in hot water, could Queens Park Rangers slip through the net? We’ll find out from 16th August.
