The Premier League champions have found themselves a new bogey team.
Crystal Palace continued their brilliant unbeaten run at the expense of Liverpool’s perfect start. Meanwhile, Chelsea were reduced to 10 men and punished once again as Villa finally picked up a win.
These are only two of the main takeaways from last week’s drama, not forgetting the Premier League starting to resemble the NFL. FromTheSpot takes a look at five things we learnt from Gameweek six.
Raucous atmospheres are proving a challenge for the Reds
Late-show specialists Liverpool had to wait until the 88th minute for a winner against Bournemouth, the 96th minute for a winner at Burnley, and left the winner at Newcastle to minute 100.
But not at Crystal Palace. And not for the first time.
When Eddie Nketiah rifled in his volley from close range, the home end erupted and the noise level was second to none.
Safe to say, Selhurst Park has one of the livelier atmospheres in the Premier League – an added challenge when playing away from home.
Turn your attention to the Champions League. Arne Slot surprised fans by dropping Salah to the bench, who was seen cupping his ears as he returned from a warmup on the sideline to drown out the deafening whistles from the Galatasaray supporters.
He was introduced after an hour, only to contribute very little as the Reds lost 1-0.
With a string of unconvincing performances from some of Slot’s star players, the defending champions seemed intimidated just by the more raucous atmospheres they’ve faced in recent weeks.
Anfield has been an utter fortress for Liverpool in the last few years, and it’s expected of Liverpool to run rings around most teams in the league at home.
But they can’t afford to allow their opponents’ more hardcore home fans – determined to jeer and make as much noise as they can all game – to rattle them.
A trip to Stamford Bridge awaits them on Saturday.
Who the key players are going forward for Nuno, and who aren’t
In their side’s unexpected second-half turnaround at Everton, Malick Diouf and Crysencio Summerville stood out as the key architects other than goal-scorer Jarrod Bowen at Nuno Espírito Santo’s West Ham.
Having shown early promise, they faded soon after Michael Keane powered home a header from a cross, something that Graham Potter struggled to deal with before his sacking last week.
However, they had also lost a lot of their attacking identity, of which a glimpse was seen in their 3-0 away win at Nottingham Forest.
Numerous times did Diouf get the better of Jake O’Brien on the left, motoring forward on the counterattack (a staple of Espírito Santo’s approach) and causing doubt in the penalty area with a succession of dangerous crosses.
As for Summerville, he looked liveliest from the off – including a moment of individual brilliance in the first half, when he glided past at least three challenges in the middle before seeing his shot blocked.
In fact, he completed the most dribbles of any player and was a constant handful for David Moyes’ backline.
James-Ward Prowse already seems to be out of favour with the Portuguese manager since his hiring.
He was removed from the squad that faced Everton, having featured in all five of Potter’s matches in charge – for at least 70 minutes.
But Nuno instead handed a debut to 21-year-old Frenchman Soungoutou Magassa, while youth graduate Freddie Potts came off the bench with Andy Irving.
The Hammers have a seriously tougher match against Arsenal at the weekend, and this new-look side will look to stake their claim.
Villa rewarded for remaining patient with Emery
Time seems to lapse faster in football. Particularly for managers.
Aston Villa had a torrid start to the 25/26 season, with no wins in their opening five games while occupying a place in the bottom three.
It was both a stark contrast to the last two seasons and a reminder of just how ruthless the Premier League can be.
Teams such as West Ham were quick to lose patience with Graham Potter after a string of poor performances.
And while you could argue that Unai Emery’s reputation and success so far with the Villans influenced their decision to stick by him, Villa finally got their reward for sticking with him as they finally won their first league game.
The Europa League winner told Sky Sports that his side were well on track to playing as he would like – despite losing on penalties to a rotated Brentford side in the Carabao Cup.
The penny may well have dropped.
Chelsea struggling to keep their discipline
Chelsea have caught the eye for the wrong reason against Manchester United and Brighton: their poor discipline.
Robert Sánchez was sent off just five minutes into the game for preventing an obvious goal-scoring opportunity, and would likely have held onto their 1-0 lead at home to Brighton had Trevor Chalobah not been dismissed.
United’s victory against them in mid-September sticks out for the sole reason that they’ve otherwise played quite badly. It was only their second win in six.
Even worse, the Brighton match deals collateral damage in a suspension to Chalobah, who has emerged as a first team pick for Enzo Maresca.
The record number of red cards for one club in a season stands at nine: Sunderland in 2009/10, QPR in 2011/12, and Chelsea will not want to join them.
Is it football or football?
Speaking of ill-discipline, the play unfolding during an NFL match would very likely be stopped every other second for infringements occurring off the ball.
But that’s just it. A report published by BBC Sport argues that Arsenal are starting to take inspiration from it.
Los Angeles Rams coach Sean McVay likened NFL to if every play in football was a set piece, which Arsenal have been able to exploit with remarkable efficiency.
The Gunners scored 22 goals from set pieces last season. It was a hallmark of Mikel Arteta’s low risk possession football, in that he and his coaching team have more control over what unfolds from corners and free kicks.
BBC Sport cited Gabriel’s header against Newcastle as an example, which was made possible by William Saliba deliberately crowding the space Nick Pope had to move into in order to catch or punch the ball.
But set pieces in general have become more common – 28.4% of goals so far this season have been scored from them, the most from over the last 10 years.
This has seemed to spark a separate debate: should these deliberate ‘blocks’ – preventing players to move into space – be called as fouls?
A charged debate involving more than 800 commenters ensued below the article, with many arguing for the interpretation that Arsenal have been unfairly impeding the progress of their opponents inside the penalty area.
Regardless of what fans believe, it’s up to the FA and IFAB to decide.
You can keep up to date with all the action from the Premier League with a new ‘five things we learnt’ from each gameweek on FromTheSpot.