Championship 2022-23 preview: the contenders, hopefuls and strugglers

Seven teams will start with a different manager from the one who finished the last campaign and no appointment is more intriguing than the four-times Premier League winner Vincent Kompany pitching up at Burnley. There are concerns about the club’s financial structure after relegation but if Kompany’s defensive expertise rubs off on CJ Egan-Riley, Taylor Harwood-Bellis and the goalkeeper Arijanet Muric, all of whom arrive from Manchester City, and Luke McNally, who has joined from Oxford, this incarnation will surely go close. As at Anderlecht, whom Kompany led to successive third-placed finishes, his sidekick will be Craig Bellamy. Teething problems are inevitable but they have an experienced core, which will be supplemented by the exuberance of Scott Twine, the League One player of the season.

West Bromwich Albion, who may benefit from a slightly softer focus than those relegated from the Premier League, are attempting to strike a more tried and trusted formula after a hugely flat campaign, with Steve Bruce eyeing a fifth promotion from the division. Goals should not be such a problem after the arrival of two of the league’s best attacking performers in Jed Wallace and John Swift, whose creativity should unlock defences and supply Karlan Grant and the fit-again Daryl Dike. Middlesbrough have arguably the best manager in the division in Chris Wilder and the signing of the Wolves loanee Ryan Giles, a consistent performer for four clubs at this level, should complement Isaiah Jones in Boro’s wing-back system, though another striker would probably represent the final piece in the jigsaw. Yo-yoing Norwich City and Watford are back in their befuddling and comforting safe zone, outside the top flight and almost certainly