Premier League Predictions, Week 26
© Micah Veldkamp, 2025
Welcome back to the weekly predictions, Premier League fans! We hope you're staying as warm and as positive as you can in these bleak February times. If you need a pick-me-up, here's one: another Premier League weekend is here! And I encourage you to really savor it, because thanks to the FA Cup (which in my unbiased opinion, nobody has ever cared about) and the return of the dreaded international break, March will hold a considerably less frequent Premier League schedule.
While my beloved Liverpool struggles through a slog of so-so form for the first time this season, last time out, I finally got myself back on track. And it was largely thanks to my Reds, in fact, who played out the very 2-1 win over Wolverhampton last weekend and 2-2 draw at Aston Villa on Wednesday that I predicted they would. I did whiff on Manchester City's big win, and Fulham's upset of Nottingham Forest (which I was oh-so-close to predicting...sigh...), but an accurate pick of Arsenal over Leicester coupled with my two dead-on Liverpool projections gave me a 4/5 week. That's enough to take me back above the .500 mark, with a 52.5/102 clip.
But! The matches this weekend have already begun, and are less than 12 hours away from kicking back off, so let's not waste any more time awarding fake trophies. Here are your 5 for Week 26!
Everton vs. Manchester United
A 7:30 AM (EST) kickoff between the league's 14th and 15th-ranked teams isn't the most scintillating fodder, sure. But Everton and Manchester United are two of the league's most fascinating stories right now. The Toffees were solidly in the thick of the relegation battle when they brought back old manager David Moyes a little over a month ago... and promptly embarked on a 5-match unbeaten streak (really a 5-match winning streak if you count the draw vs. Liverpool last week as a win, which Lord knows Everton fans do). Man United fans, meanwhile, must be looking at this weekend's opponents with resigned envy; the rotating door of managers in the post-Alex Ferguson era, which ironically began with Everton's new old manager, has not yielded one modicum of real success or, frankly, happiness for the Red Devils beyond a couple FA Cup titles. When they poached Ruben Amorim from Portugal last November, many in football punditry believed they were getting one of the top young managers in the sport, and yet, he looks as helpless as the several who came before him as Man United sink to previously undiscovered depths. I do think there is an end to this dismay for United-- perhaps this season, perhaps next --but they look like a broken team at the moment, and Everton's uptick in form is legit.
The Pick: Everton, 2-1
Arsenal vs. West Ham United
Arsenal's injury laundry list keeps growing, and the preseason odds-on favorite to win the Premier League hasn't sniffed the top of the table in many months...and yet? They keep finding ways to win matches, sometimes in very impressive fashion, and coinciding with Liverpool's roughest stretch of the season, it's resulted in them thoroughly hanging around in the Premier League title race. Such is the nature of this particular league season and such is, frankly, the tendency of Arsenal that very few if any matches the Gunners play from here on out will be gimmes. That said, West Ham is bad-- perhaps the worst of any team that's not (yet) a real relegation candidate --and this one's in the friendly confines of the Emirates. This is the closest thing to a gimme that Arsenal is gonna get.
The Pick: Arsenal, 4-1
Aston Villa vs. Chelsea
What a strange old week it's been for Aston Villa, who tomorrow will play their third match at Villa Park since last Saturday. It began with a disappointing home draw against bottom-feeders Ipswich Town, but picked up significantly with the scintillating 2-2 draw (one that could have easily been a win) vs. league leaders Liverpool two days ago. And that reminder of just how good they can be might have come at the perfect time, as they received news this morning that their Round of 16 opponent in the Champions League is minnows Club Brugge, and they host a Chelsea side tomorrow that will be needing to bring their A-game to stay in the Top 4 race. The Blues were a bona fide title contender not all that long ago, but the last couple months has seen their form take on the wildly inconsistent shape that's been a hallmark of their last few seasons. I still take their talent and depth over most anyone in the league, and I think they might have finally found a manager with staying power in Enzo Maresca, but they're not mentally strong enough for me to believe they're going to give a good Aston Villa team a winless week at home.
The Pick: Aston Villa, 3-2
Newcastle United vs. Nottingham Forest
This match will command a lot less attention than the other Sunday morning showdown, but it has the potential to be a belter. Two good team, two of the league's brightest managers in Eddie Howe vs. Nuno Espirito Santo, the high-flying, freewheeling style of the former against the well-drilled, sharp counter-attacking nous of the latter... but it's also two teams who really could use a win after gutting losses last weekend. Nottingham's stumble at Fulham isn't an embarrassing one, but it does come awfully close to shutting the door on their audacious title dreams, as they now sit a good 14 points behind Liverpool. Newcastle, meanwhile, just can't generate any sort of sustained momentum, losing 3 of their last 4, but the most recent was most costly, as it allowed Manchester City AND Bournemouth to jump them in the standings. The Magpies are still only 3 points out of the Top 4, but run the risk of slipping further behind the competition if they are to drop points in this one. I could see this going any which way, but I think Newcastle is bound to pick up a win somewhere amongst an incredibly difficult stretch, and at home in a match with a clear talent advantage seems like the most likely candidate.
The Pick: Newcastle, 2-1
Manchester City vs. Liverpool
The weekend's marquee matchup is one that has been something of a title tilt so often in the last 6+ years, since the heyday of Pep Guardiola's City and Jurgen Klopp's Liverpool. This time around, it's a crucial showdown in a bit of an odd way: the four-time defending champions are desperate for a big win just to stay in the thick of the Top 4 race, while the league leaders are desperate for a big win to turn around their tired form, which has seen them play to more Premier League draws and all-competition losses in the month and a half of 2025 than they faced from August through December 2024. There have been enough false starts on Man City's 'bounceback form' already in the last few weeks alone to suggest that it's just not going to happen for them this season. But, frustrating season as it might have been thus far, there have still been enough moments of quality, such as last weekend's destruction of Newcastle, to show that there's still an elite team in there. And I think we all know which version of City is bound to show up at the Etihad in a huge match on Sunday; Liverpool's form is going to cost them a second league loss if it doesn't turn around soon, and I have a bad feeling this match might be that second loss and not the turnaround.
The Pick: Man City, 3-1
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