Aston Villa, Tottenham Hotspur, Manchester United all suffer defeats in Premier League opener

The new Premier League season is barely 72 hours old and already delivering chaos. Aston Villa, Tottenham Hotspur, and Manchester United, three clubs with serious ambitions this campaign, all lost their opening fixtures in emphatic fashion over the August 22-24 weekend. Villa were demolished 4-0 by Brighton. Spurs fell 3-0 to Brentford. And Manchester United managed to lose 2-0 to newly promoted Hull City, a result so unusual it has no precedent in the club’s history. A weekend to forget Tottenham’s Friday night visit to Brentford set the tone for what would become a grim 48 hours for the league’s traditional powers. The 3-0 defeat equaled Spurs’ joint-heaviest opening-day loss in Premier League history. Manchester United’s result was arguably worse. Losing to Hull City, fresh off their promotion from the Championship, marked the first time United have dropped an opening fixture to a newly promoted side. Hull managed two goals without reply. Aston Villa’s Saturday trip to Brighton completed the trifecta of disappointment. A 4-0 loss is ugly in any context, but Nilsson-Lindelöf’s own goal compounded an already dire afternoon, and a first-half red card effectively ended the contest a...