Leicester City became the first English league champions for 27 years to begin their title defence with a loss as they went down 2-1 at Hull City on Saturday and Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City reign started with a 2-1 win over Sunderland.
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And it all got a bit too much for Vardy who was caught on camera striking himself in anger after wasting an opportunity.
“For this reason I told them we must be very strong together because last season we showed ourselves as a very good team and we need to repeat that”.
Hull restored the lead through Robert Snodgrass and held on to secure a historic victory. However, the hunger, desire, passion, and general togetherness shown by the eleven players, who played the full 90 minutes today, filled me with a confidence I did not possess just hours before our Premier League season kicked-off, and made me proud to be a Hull City supporter once again.
“The first games are always hard”.
“It was great to see the team and staff all pull together and surprise so many people”, said caretaker manager Mike Phelan.
With $200 million spent on new players and Guardiola arriving from Bayern Munich to manage an already impressive lineup, City is the favorite to win the league this season.
Ross Barkley had given new manager Ronald Koeman an ideal start to life at Goodison Park with a fifth-minute free kick.
Tottenham goalkeeper Hugo Lloris limped off with a hamstring injury in the 35th minute. “So our job is really hard but we want to win matches, we want to win competitions, and to win isolated matches you can play bad but to win competitions you need to play well”. “In the second half we played as we usually play”.
Please don’t get me wrong, one swallow does not make a summer, and I think there is in fact a danger that this superb result could counter-productively disguise some fairly fundamental issues within the club which must be addressed in the next few weeks.
Meanwhile, Swansea won 1-0 at promoted Burnley courtesy of an 82nd-minute strike by Leroy Fer.
Etienne Capoue put Watford ahead in the ninth minute, but Nathan Redmond levelled in the 58th minute before Hornets midfielder Ben Watson was sent off.
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In the other games of the day, another newly promoted side Middlesborough were held to a 1-1 draw by Stoke City.
