Premier League 2019/20 - Best XI of Gameweek 1

Raheem Sterling hit the ground running for Manchester City with a hattrick against West Ham
Raheem Sterling hit the ground running for Manchester City with a hattrick against West Ham

An enthralling start of the season saw Manchester City pick up where they left off last season, Liverpool asserted their dominance over newly promoted Norwich City, Tottenham Hotspur fought their way back from a goal down to crush Aston Villa's hopes for a winning start, Arsenal scraped past Newcastle, and Manchester United knocked the wind out of Chelsea with a 4-0 beating. What a way to restart the Premier League!

Amid all the action were early indicators of who may have a good season and who are contenders for the relegation places. None to be taken too seriously yet, but while some made a signal of intent, others seemed like they lacked any direction.

Premier League 2019/20 Gameweek 1: Team of the Week
Premier League 2019/20 Gameweek 1: Team of the Week

There's a long season ahead but some players stood out from the others, some expected, others new to viewers of the Premier League. All told, they went above and beyond the requirements to make Team of the Week.

Let's take a look back at some of the most impressive individual performances of Gameweek 1:

Goalkeeper

Matt Ryan made 3 very important saves to keep Brighton's clean sheet
Matt Ryan made 3 very important saves to keep Brighton's clean sheet

Aussie Mathew Ryan is the man in goal for the Team of the Week in Gameweek 1. The 27-year-old was commanding in the box and made a couple of important saves against Watford. The stand out moment was when Ryan made a save with his feet to keep Brighton ahead in the game. Had that shot made it past him, Graham Potter's tenure at Brighton may have begun very differently.

David De Gea also starred for Manchester United in a 4-0 win that saw Chelsea take 7 shots on goal and be thwarted by the Spaniard. Though De Gea seems to be back to form, Ryan wins out on needing to make more difficult saves than the Manchester United custodian.

Chelsea's shots, though on target, would hardly be classified as difficult saves, Ryan, however, had to deal with a lot more considering intense pressure from Watford to try and get back into the game before Brighton scored two more to seal the result.

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Defenders

Van Dijk began the Premier League campaign with a goal against Norwich City
Van Dijk began the Premier League campaign with a goal against Norwich City

Aaron Wan-Bissaka played an absolute blinder at right-back against Chelsea, allowing neither Ross Barkley nor Christian Pulisic to get the better of him. His ability to not just defend one-on-one, but to win the ball and keep it under pressure is going to be Manchester United's strength on the right hand side.

Both our players in centre-back were solid in defence but also showed the ability to carry the ball out from the back and start the play going forward. Brighton's Lewis Dunk, who was linked with Leicester as a Harry Maguire replacement, showed why the Foxes were in for him. Adding to his defensive showing, he also played a well thought out through ball to assist Brighton's third goal scored by new boy Neal Maupay.

Need I say too much about Virgil van Dijk? He was out there once again, putting a stop to any ideas Norwich had to upset Liverpool. He's the only one in this backline to concede a goal, but also the only one in the backline to score this weekend as well.

At left-back is Burnley's Erik Pieters. The former Stoke City man surprised many by even starting the game, but he silenced any doubters with his performance. Only Liverpool's Fabinho and Aston Villa's John McGinn made more tackles (8) than the left-back (7) in the opening weekend.

He also jointly leads the assist tables alongside Paul Pogba and Riyad Mahrez with two assists.

Midfield

Pogba dictated the play against Chelsea
Pogba dictated the play against Chelsea

The base of the midfield is all French. Spurs' new signing Tanguy Ndombele was a breath of fresh air in Mauricio Pochettino's midfield. They started without Christian Eriksen, and it would be fair to say they missed his presence, but Ndombele stepped it up and was able to shield his backline at one end while also linking play at the other.

Once Eriksen was on the pitch, the link-up closer to Villa's goal went up a notch and Ndombele really started to shine. The screamer to equalize and start Spurs' comeback was just the cherry on top.

His partner in this Team of the Week midfield double pivot is Manchester United's Paul Pogba. It was one of those performances where he looked untouchable. Though he started off closer to Chelsea's goal, once Manchester United had taken the lead through Rashford's penalty, Pogba dropped deeper and was able to dictate play.

He bypassed Chelsea's midfield easily, finding Rashford's run for his first assist and ending a great run with a layoff for Daniel James to complete a brace of assists.

On either wings, we have blistering pace. The Egyptian Mohamed Salah running down the right-wing and cutting in to destroy any defence is pretty standard. It was in full display against a Norwich side that allowed Salah the space to punish them as the Liverpool forward scored and assisted in a 4-1 victory to kick off the campaign.

Marcus Rashford, who may need to score a lot of goals this season for a Lukaku-less Manchester United, got off to a good start, getting 2 goals against Chelsea. Rashford running in from the left to take on the Chelsea defence worked wonders on more than one occasion, as he won a penalty on the first occasion and was able to find space between the two centre-backs for the second to go on and score both times.

Forwards

Kane scored two in Tottenham's 3-1 win over Aston Villa
Kane scored two in Tottenham's 3-1 win over Aston Villa

Could we have afforded to leave hat-trick hero Raheem Sterling out? Not really. Manchester City's blue-eyed boy continued his good goalscoring form from last season to lead the Golden Boot race early on.

He could've had 4 if Sergio Aguero had let him take the penalty to complete his hat-trick. Although, he would go on to achieve it nonetheless. Sterling could've even had an assist if his left armpit wasn't ruled offside in a real farce of a VAR decision. This really tells you the magnitude of Sterling's performance and City's dominance against West Ham.

The man who never scores in August scored two against Aston Villa to snatch all three points for Tottenham. Harry Kane broke his August hoo-doo and clinched victory after having come up against a heroic and organised Aston Villa.

Tottenham's talisman had a fairly uneventful first half but started to assert himself in the second and scored the decisive second, as a fortunate ricochet ended up at his feet from Lamela's shot, and the hoo-doo was broken.

Minutes later, Kane would double his August tally from the edge of the box to complete his brace.

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