The opening fixtures of the 2025/26 Premier League season will feature a number of early and potentially awkward reunions, including Arsenal at Old Trafford.
Almost every opening weekend fixture of the upcoming Premier League campaign could see a player immediately debut against their former club. Brighton v Fulham is the exception, because who would leave one of those to join the other?
Milos Kerkez
Having paid around £45m to Liverpool for Dominic Solanke, Jordon Ibe, Brad Smith and the loans of Harry Wilson and Nat Phillips in the last decade, it is only fair that Bournemouth have quoted the Reds about as much to sign Kerkez.
Jamie Redknapp’s reign as the only player the Reds have ever purchased directly from Bournemouth is almost over. Perhaps Kerkez will help show his former employers around Anfield when they make the ludicrously long trip up on a Friday sodding night.
Harvey Barnes and Jacob Ramsey
The biannual reminder that swap deals rarely happen – and are often disastrous for at least one party when they do – should never preclude reckless speculation.
Then again, as chief architects of the more absurd PSR-takes last summer, Aston Villa and Newcastle can surely engineer another back-scratching player trade scenario to log in their respective books.
Villa will be hoping their second opening fixture in three seasons against Newcastle augurs slightly better for them than the first, a 5-1 demolition at St James’ Park in August 2023 which belied their subsequent campaigns.
Barnes scored the final goal that day and retains admirers at Villa Park, while the Magpies see a shiny future for Ramsey. Neither manager would be enamoured with the loss of such excellent squad players but that headroom won’t manufacture itself.
Yoane Wissa
There have been forecasts of a Brentford exodus but as yet the troops have not followed Thomas Frank.
The expectation is that Bryan Mbeumo will jump aboard the entirely and hilariously capsized SS Ratcliffe soon enough, although Brentford are under no financial pressure to sell any player and would prefer dugout upheaval not to translate to the pitch.
But Nottingham Forest have been tailing Wissa since having at least one bid rejected by the Bees for the striker in January. Armed with Conference League football, they will return this summer and hope to deliver Chris Wood some support.
Eliezer Mayenda
The youngest team in the Championship has not yet been properly plundered, even if Sunderland could not hope to resist the overtures of Brighton and Borussia Dortmund when they came calling for Tom Watson and Jobe Bellingham.
It might be that West Ham discover they do not have that same transfer pull if one of the worst surviving Premier League clubs of last season try and throw their weight around against the promoted Black Cats.
Teenager Chris Rigg and play-off hero Mayenda are on the radar of Graham Potter, who must sell to buy before signing the next victim of the West Ham striker curse.
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Maxime Esteve
“There is a player that I like a lot in the Premier League that not everyone talks about – Micky van de Ven. He is very quick and I like him a lot because I think that I have the same speedy qualities, even if he is a lot quicker,” said Esteve recently in an interview which also revealed his childhood infatuation with the north London version of Gareth Bale.
“My dream is to play for a top-six team in England,” the Burnley centre-half added. He might settle for a Champions League side in 17th if Spurs revive a move which led to a reported £20m bid in January.
Rayan Ait-Nouri
It feels like Matheus Cunha could have taken some tips on departing on good terms from former teammate Ait-Nouri, who kept his counsel for five “very good” years at Wolves before wishing his “friends” well as “everyone was incredible in this team”.
The reunion will be immediate at Molineux on August 16 – and the Club World Cup is rubbish enough for us to ignore how it will mark the Algerian’s actual debut it he does play.
Marc Guehi
Newcastle might overcome their dense seven-word transfer stance at some point and spend a bit of money, but until then their transfer shortlist contains only Premier League names and is eternally topped by Guehi.
The Magpies had four summer 2024 offers rejected by Crystal Palace, who also stood firm when Spurs enquired and will hope to resist reported interest from Arsenal.
It being an association football transfer, Chelsea are inevitably implicated. The Blues have been intermittently linked with a defender they sold for £18m in July 2021 and there is a suggestion they, too, might try and take advantage of Guehi’s expiring contract.
Jadon Sancho
How else could Arsenal possibly follow up the loan of Raheem Sterling? Marcus Rashford is right there but it feels like that move could actually work, which is sub-optimal.
Beto
Leeds have a £254.5m promoted XI to break into and key to that could be Everton forward Beto, whose seven goals in 19 games under David Moyes helped push the Toffees comfortably to safety last season.
Daniel Farke would hope for the same impact from the Guinean, who could even sit under the Patrick Bamford learning tree for a while.
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