Following last season’s historic four-in-a-row triumph, Manchester City enter the new term aiming to defend our top-flight title and win an unprecedented fifth straight championship.
That quest starts with a trip to Chelsea on Sunday 18 August, with kick-off at Stamford Bridge scheduled for 16:30 (UK).
Before the curtain raises, though, there have been a number of changes across the Premier League.
TEAM NEWS
The best way to access Pep Guardiola’s starting Premier League line-ups is by downloading the Official Man City App and allowing push notifications.
Alternatively, Matchday Live will announce who is playing during our live broadcast before each match.
And starting line-ups across the division can now be confirmed and published up to 75 minutes before kick-off – 15 minutes earlier than in past campaigns.
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OFFSIDES
The Premier League is expecting semi-automated offside technology to be implemented across the division following one of the autumn international breaks.
The Premier League have released the following statement on this:
“Computer vision cameras powered by Genius Sports will be installed in every Premier League stadium. These cameras around the ground will track the ball as well as thousands of data points for each player and the ball.
“When a match-defining moment occurs, such as a penalty, a goal or a red card, the technology will track to see if any attacking player involved in the build-up to the incident was offside.
“If a player receives a ball in an offside position, the technology will send an alert to the officials in the VAR Hub.
“They will check that the point of contact with the ball and automated offside line have been correctly recorded. The VAR will then inform the on-field officials if an offside has been recorded.
“The hope is that on average offside decisions will be made more than 30 seconds faster than last season under the old system.
“There will be occasions of occlusion of the ball (it being hidden from the cameras among a group of players), ‘edge decisions’ or subjective decisions of whether an offside player was interfering with play, which will require intervention from the VAR, and possibly the on-field referee in the latter instance.”
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ADDED TIME
Across the league campaign, the Premier League have stated there will be a ‘more accurate calculation of added time’.
Match officials will only start adding time onto the end of matches when the delay between the goal and the subsequent kick-off exceeds 30 seconds.
The Premier League say ‘this will allow natural time for both teams to resume their restart positions after each goal’.
SUBSTITUTES WARMING UP
A slight alteration to the upcoming season is the number of substitutes allowed to warm-up at the same time on the sideline has risen from three to five players per team.
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This is now to ‘correspond with the fact that teams are able to make five substitutions at any one time’.
MULTIBALL
To speed up each league match, the Premier League will practice the multiball system in 2024/25 with 15 balls in use.
The league’s official statement says: “When the match ball goes out of play and is not quickly retrievable, players must go to the nearest cone to collect a replacement ball themselves to restart play.
“Ball assistants are not permitted to return a ball to a player but should return it to a vacant cone.
“But from this season, an exception to this rule has been introduced in that the ball assistants positioned behind the goals at the end where the ball goes out are allowed to return a ball to the goalkeeper who will take the restart.
“It remains the case that a club’s technical area staff who deliberately delay the restart of play by holding on to the ball, kicking the ball away, etc will be sent off. Any players who do the same in the technical area will receive a yellow card.”
LAW CHANGES
Not only have there been changes in Premier League rules in 2024/25, but there have also been changes made to the Laws of the Game by the International Football Association Board (IFAB).
The Premier League website states: “Firstly, in Law 12 on fouls and misconduct, there is a clarification introduced that non-deliberate handball offences for which penalties are awarded are to be sanctioned in the same way as fouls which are an attempt to play the ball or a challenge for the ball.
“In short, referees will not automatically show a yellow card to players who have handled the ball and conceded a penalty.
“Then around the penalty kick itself, or Law 14, a couple of changes have been made.
“Firstly, there is a clarification that when the penalty-taker places the ball, part of the ball must touch or overhang the centre of the penalty mark.
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“Secondly, encroachment by players at the moment the penalty is taken will be penalised only if it has an impact, following the same philosophy as goalkeeper encroachment at a kick.
“So, for a defender, his encroachment will be relevant only if he either has an impact on the kicker or, in the event that the ball rebounds into play, prevents a goal or prevents a goalscoring chance.
“For an attacker, his encroachment is relevant only if he impacts or distracts the goalkeeper, scores a goal or creates a goalscoring chance.
“The encroachment at a restart such as a penalty is determined by the feet or any part of the player’s body that is touching the ground.”
PL MATCH CENTRE
A new X (formerly Twitter) account has been launched to provide near-live explainers and updates on operational and officiating decisions for every Premier League fixture.
The account is titled @PLMatchCentre and the Premier League statement reads: “The account will post factual explanations of on-pitch refereeing decisions and the involvement of the video assistant referee (VAR) including the role of technology in the decision-making process.
“In the absence of live VAR audio being broadcast, as it is not permitted in football, the Premier League Match Centre will be able to relay on social media near-live information from the VAR Hub during a game.”
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