Premier League manager starts ranked: Arteta near the bottom, Slot seventh | OneFootball

Ahead of Michael Carrick’s first game of this particular spell in charge of Manchester United, we’ve ranked the first impressions offered by all the Premier League managers…

It’s a Big Weekend for Carrick as he leads United into the Manchester derby against City.

Doubtless he would be delighted to enjoy similar early success as Liam Rosenior – but the Chelsea boss can’t even crack the top five with a 5-1 win in his first game in charge of the Blues.

19) Keith Andrews – Nottingham Forest 3-1 Brentford

As first impressions go, Andrews’ was a shocker. In his first game as a head coach, Brentford were 3-0 down at half-time on the opening weekend of the season after Forest ran all over them, prompting much smugness amongst those of us who pinned Andrews’ side as relegation fodder.

18) Rob Edwards – Wolves 0-2 Crystal Palace

Few could hold defeat in his opening game against Edwards, so poor were the team he took over. Second-half goals from Daniel Munoz and Yeremy Pino took Palace fourth and left Wolves bottom and winless in 12. It took eight more games for Edwards to taste victory when Wolves met the only side as f***ed as they are.

17) David Moyes – Everton 0-1 Aston Villa

No new returning manager bounce for Everton – not immediately – with Moyes seeing his side sunk by Ollie Watkins five days after he replaced Sean Dyche. After one win in 12, sat in 16th place, it was a sobering illustration of the task at hand.

But Moyes then turned Everton around, winning four of their next five and avoiding defeat in their next nine.

16) Mikel Arteta – Bournemouth 1-1 Arsenal

“I am not happy we have not won the game but happy overall. In terms of attitude, desire and commitment it was better than I expected,” said Arteta after his first match as a head coach in any capacity, when he could not give away shares of trust in his process.

Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang equalised after Dan Gosling’s opener to give Arteta a point against Eddie Howe’s Bournemouth. That sentence makes no sense in big 2026. Thierry Henry was not impressed.

15) Marco Silva – Fulham 1-1 Middlesbrough

On humble beginnings this Fulham revolution has been built. The Cottagers had been relegated but managed to improve on their managerial situation, with Scott Parker leaving by mutual consent en route to Bournemouth as Silva took up his first post since leaving Everton about 18 months before.

It was an undoubted coup, just not one made immediately obvious by a draw with Neil Warnock’s Middlesbrough. Harry Wilson scored a delightful goal from outside the area because obviously.

14) Daniel Farke – Leeds United 2-2 Cardiff

Farke’s first Leeds side on the opening day of the Championship season in 2023/24 featured only three players who played in the last Premier League game in May.

And though a home draw with Cardiff sounds underwhelming, it could have been worse, with the hosts 2-0 down at half time. Crysencio Summerville’s added-time equaliser made a draw feel like a victory.

13) Andoni Iraola – Bournemouth 1-1 West Ham

After a summer of bleating about how harshly Gary O’Neil had been treated by nasty Bournemouth, the time had come for the Cherries to show their working out. A draw with West Ham was respectable enough without coming close to confounding the critics.

Solanke equalised after Jarrod Bowen’s opener, meaning that West Ham had conceded decisive goals scored by summer transfer targets in the first game of consecutive Premier League seasons. Which feels particularly on brand.

12) Nuno – Everton 1-1 West Ham

Nuno replaced Graham Potter on the Saturday before a creditable draw at Everton on the Monday. The new manager made a point of acknoeldging the away support: “It’s our priority to become closer with our fans and bridge the gap, and to deliver so they appreciate the work of the team.”

11) Thomas Frank – PSG 2-2 Tottenham (PSG won on pens)

Taking charge of the Europa League winners, Frank’s first official game in charge was the UEFA Super Cup final against Champions League winners PSG. And it was all going swimmingly when Spurs led 2-0  – Micky van de Ven and Cristian Romero on target – with five minutes of normal time remaining.

But, Spurs. Nine minutes later, they had been pegged back before they fluffed a penalty shoot-out.

10) Pep Guardiola – Manchester City 2-1 Sunderland

A victory, but for once that wasn’t really all that mattered. After months of forewarning that Our League would not simply bend to his will and Guardiola would be found out against the sort of proper competition neither La Liga nor the Bundesliga could provide, this was a thoroughly underwhelming start.

The hosts needed an 87th-minute Paddy McNair own goal after an early Sergio Aguero penalty to prevail against a Sunderland side which would be relegated come what May, with the unceremonious axing of Joe Hart from the starting line-up a major point of early contention.

9) Regis Le Bris – Cardiff 0-2 Sunderland

Le Bris was appointed in the summer of 2024 and whatever scepticism there may have been of the Frenchman on Wearside soon dissipated when an away win at Cardiff, thanks to goals from Luke O’Nien and Jack Clarke, formed the first of four successive wins to kick off the Championship season.

Le Bris’ team featured only two names – Trai Hume and Eliezer Mayenda – who started the opening day of the following season in the Premier League.

8) Eddie Howe – Newcastle 3-3 Brentford

A high-scoring draw in which Newcastle led but needed two equalisers to salvage a point despite having more than twice as many shots, leaving them bottom of the Premier League in late November, confirmed for many the suspicion that this would be a rehash of his exciting but defensively-flawed Bournemouth reign.

Joelinton scored in a neat indicator of his prosperous future under Howe, who was actually confined to a hotel room with the ‘rona and so happily handed over the reins to a bashful and reluctant Jason Tindall. If Newcastle’s manager would prefer we can instead assess his first game in the dugout: a 2-0 loss to Arsenal the following week.

7) Arne Slot – Ipswich 0-2 Liverpool

Ipswich provided a first taste of English football for Slot, who would have known that while anything but a win against their promoted hosts would have been a disaster, no standard of victory could possibly have dispelled those festering post-Klopp concerns.

As it was, Slot pretty much nailed it with that ruthless but ultimately vindicated half-time sacrifice of Jarell Quansah, after which Diogo Jota and Mo Salah scored to mark a humble start to the brave new era.

6) Liam Rosenior – Charlton 1-5 Chelsea

Rosenior swerved a west London derby at Fulham immediately after his arrival – a smart move – to first take charge of Chelsea for the first time in an FA Cup third-round win at Championship strugglers Charlton.

“It’s a good start. It’s just the start and we have to stay consistent now in a very, very hectic schedule.” So, of course, they lost his home game: a 3-2 defeat to Arsenal in the Carabao Cup semi-final.

5) Sean Dyche – Nottingham Forest 2-0 Porto

Dyche took over from Ange Postecoglou on the Tuesday before guiding Forest to their first win in the Europa League on Thursday thanks to penalties in each half.

“I don’t want to be a purist. I want to mix the game. I want to play long, I want to stretch teams,” said Dyche just in case Forest fans had been living on another planet for the last decade.

4) Scott Parker – Luton 1-4 Burnley

Having replaced Vincent Kompany in the summer, Parker took Burnley to Luton on the opening weekend of the 2024-25 season in a battle of two sides just relegated from the Premier League.

The Clarets won convincingly, setting the tone for both clubs. Parker took Burnley back up; Luton’s slide continued all the way to League One.

3) Oliver Glasner – Crystal Palace 3-0 Burnley

The uncertainty of their second post-Hodgson years soon gave way to an unfamiliar sense of exhilaration as a Palace side which rarely scored at all netted thrice in the second half in front of a disbelieving Selhurst Park.

Jean-Philippe Mateta opened his personal Glasner account and there was ample room for a first Premier League clean sheet in four months. The streets shan’t forget February to May 2024, when Crystal Palace were the greatest team in Europe.

2) Unai Emery – Aston Villa 3-1 Manchester United

“I am so happy… it was a special day today,” said the new Villa boss after taking charge for the first time, when they made United look very much second-best. Villa fans almost universally welcomed Emery’s appointment after a year of Steven Gerrard and the players buzzed off it too, racing into a two-goal lead inside 11 minutes. Even when United pulled one back courtesy of a lucky deflection, Villa still kept their visitors at arm’s length and ran out comfortable winners. Not that anyone could have predicted where Emery might take Villa.

1) Fabian Hurzeler – Everton 0-3 Brighton

The youngest manager in Premier League history made an early mockery of sneering suggestions that Brighton were being too clever for their own good when picking their successor to Roberto De Zerbi.

Brighton invested £200m to make Hurzeler’s transition as smooth as possible and it showed: five different players scored or assisted in a thorough dismantling of a decent Premier League side.