VICE Sports Premier League Team by Team Preview: The Bottom Third

(Ed. note: This week, VICE Sports previews the start of the 2015 Premier League Season. You can find all the stories here. This story originally appeared on VICE Sports UK.)

In part one of our Premier League team by team preview we take a look at the clubs either expected to be fighting relegation this term, or likely to sack their manager after a festive wobble before appointing Sam Allardyce and cruising to mid-table obscurity.

Villa can never be relegated. They've made some Faustian pact or something. Having the worst squad in the league for years, keeping the faith with Paul Lambert while he clearly lost track of what he was doing, then making Tim Sherwood their big replacement to get them out of trouble, and it actually somehow fucking working – they've done everything possible to go down, and it's just not happening.

Thankfully, that now gives us a season to focus on Sherwood, in charge of a real Premier League club with a big ground that's even won a European Cup, where he commands the respect of the players and fans and is trusted to make real decisions with quite a lot of money. It's the most fascinating prospect of the whole season ahead.

Well, they might go down. Following the departures of Christian Benteke and Fabian Delph, they've embarked on a classic post-selling-best-player spending spree, spreading the wealth among a load of transfers. This occasionally results in genius (Southampton 2014) but far more often doesn't (Spurs 2013, Liverpool 2014.) If Sherwood pulls this off – and the deals have been concluded with a speed that suggests supreme confidence – then it might be time to start considering the unthinkable: is he actually a really good manager? Maybe when Rafael Benitez suffers his inevitable sacking, Real Madrid can resurrect that old Jack Walter quote: What do you need Zinedine Zidane for when there's Tim Sherwood?

Despite looking like a man running for Leeds Student Union president, Eddie Howe is not the youngest manager in the Premier League. He might, however, be the most doomed.

Bournemouth have spent big in recent years, but within a definitively Championship context, and ignoring basket-cases who have been pissing money around the place like Blackburn and QPR. They're one of the many clubs that have tried to buy their way out of the Championship to bask in that sweet Premier League TV money, and are probably going to finish the window with the worst or second-worst squad.

Still, with them joining the legions of southern clubs in the Premier League, we can now have a Harry Redknapp derby pretty much every weekend, where opponents argue about who hates him the most and who he fucked up the worst. It's also another away day by the sea, so what are you complaining about? Enjoy them while they're here, and try and forget them when they go straight back down.

Things were looking pretty good for Leicester when they finally found a run of decent form at the end of the season –they had money, a solid enough squad, and a manager with a plan. Then that sextape happened, and now they look a bit fucked.

Claudio Ranieri might only last until Martin O'Neill inevitably resigns after his Ireland failure and goes back to his ex, but his recent track record is not a great one and it might not keep an already pretty poor squad up. It's amazing what a sextape and a bit of racial abuse can do to a club.

Pearson, as we now know, resigned on the basis that his son wasn't actually partaking in any racial abuse, just sitting there enjoying getting rimmed. The Cosmo columns weren't lying, lads – a sex act appearing in a footballer orgy is like Nick Grimshaw dropping a track on Radio 1, the standard seal of mainstream approval. Hardly a word was spoken of it, but if Leicester go down and lose £80 million in TV money, that might end up being the most expensive rimming of all time.

Norwich are back after a short stint out of the top flight. Alex Neil became the latest manager to profit from the post-Fergie "he's Glaswegian, he must be good" assumption made by chairmen across the country, while Norwich lucked out when it transpired he really was. He might have been appointed as a Lidl Paul Lambert, but much like the produce of the popular budget German supermarket, it turns out he's actually bloody good value, too. Immediately after his appointment, Norwich enjoyed some ridiculous form and are now back among the big boys.

The problem is, the squad still looks distinctly Championship-shaped. A couple of reasonable, pacy youngsters punctuate a slow old parade of veteran battlers and cloggers. It's a team of future caretaker managers. They should be certain to go down, and they can only hold out hope that Neil really is the next Fergie if they're to have a realistic shot at survival.

Get off to disastrous start, sack manager, replace with slightly esoteric choice but nonetheless good football man who's been around the block and will really give the dressing room the kick up the arse it needs, hammer Newcastle, scrape survival, big summer overhaul, get off to disastrous start, sack manager, replace with yada yada yada.

Odds for next Sunderland manager: Sam Allardyce 3/1, Mick McCarthy 4/1, Neil Lennon 6/1, Lee Cattermole 8/1

The caption for this image reads 'Lee Cattermole vies for the ball with Oscar'. Which is one way of putting it. | Photo by EPA/Gerry Penny

It seems like a long time coming for Watford to finally make it back to the Premier League. They've already given us the greatest season climax of all time, so what do they have left to offer?

Well, of all the teams coming up, they seem to be the only one buying decent players. The play-offs might have opened up the Premier League to a few exciting rabbles like Blackpool and Burnley, but the division has become an increasingly closed shop; Bournemouth and Norwich look to be half-doomed before a ball's been kicked.

But we can probably expect basic competence from Watford. No mavericks, no lunatic managers, and even the owners are among the four sane Italian chairmen in the universe. They're going to be to the Elton John-John Barnes era what Rickie Lambert was to Matt Le Tissier. A solid 14th-placed finish is nailed on.

@callum_th