Every summer the Premier League relights the argument. New players are brought on and managers announce tweaks, the preseason scores give broad conclusions, and fans start speculating who will win the trophy in May. The biggest July story very rarely lasts the length of a 38-game season.
Spending in transfers and preseason results can provide evidence of intent, but are not good indicators of good championships. The importance of competitive depth, injury management, defensive reliability and point collection when times get tough is much greater. The Premier League is filled with examples of teams that follow patterns of success when they come up with a new and revolutionary way to do things.
When betting on early Premier League futures, that's a starting point, not a guarantee. Some significant issues include pace, goal difference, defence and position at Christmas. It's a fair bet that the 2026-27 prospects will be the better ones to compare to those benchmarks when they're looking to make a decision on a soccer season preview instead of reacting to one headline signing or exhibition result.
The side that topped the league at the end of December has won 18 of 34 Premier League seasons, or 52.9%. It's significant but not critical. Liverpool have done it twice, in 2019-20 and 2024-25, while Manchester City have managed it once (2021-22) and Arsenal finally got it right in 2025-26 after four other attempts.
Arsenal's near miss in 2022-23 is a prime example of why the festive season table shouldn't be taken as given. They were five points ahead at Christmas but ended five points behind City. The Christmas lead is important because it represents performance over about half of the schedule, including autumn tests. It also provides cover ahead of the busy winter transfer window where rotation, recovery, and squad depth are made apparent.
Nevertheless, the brightest live indicator isn't necessarily first place. A true contender needs to be in the top two, near to the two points per match, and have some numbers behind him. It can come undone swiftly when the temporary leadership is based on a narrow victory, a favorable finish or an unusually easy schedule.
In 2017/18 Manchester City managed to score 100 goals. That's the gold standard. City also netted 106 goals and had a plus-79 goal difference, and started a trend of pushing contenders to near perfection. The champion over the previous decade (Chelsea 16-17 to Arsenal 25-26) averaged 90.0 goals scored, 30.9 conceded, and a plus-59.1 differential.
The defence lesson is particularly memorable. Chelsea's 16-17 season was the only one not to have either the worst or second worst goals against average among the top ten, with nine of the other ten having the worst or second worst. The latest 'challenge' proved the principle in Arsenal's case. They conceded 27 goals and managed 71 goals, which is still quite a bit less than usual in today's championship but they were able to convert control, set-pieces and narrow chances into 85-points.
| Season | Champion | Points | GF | GA |
| 2021-22 | Manchester City | 93 | 99 | 26 |
| 2022-23 | Manchester City | 89 | 94 | 33 |
| 2023-24 | Manchester City | 81 | 96 | 23 |
| 2024-25 | Liverpool | 84 | 86 | 41 |
| 2025-26 | Arsenal | 85 | 71 | 27 |
The ten champions from 2005-06 through 2014-15 averaged 87.4 points. The ten from 2016-17 through 2025-26 averaged 91.8. Positional control by Guardiola, pressing pressure from Klopp and Arteta's tidy, efficient system meant that it became a costly operation to lose points in a tactical duel.
But with Liverpool and Arsenal having earned 84 and 85 points respectively in the past two years, 90 is not a hard cap. Is more appropriately thought of as a safety goal. Typically, a contender with a score between 84 and 86 points would need rivals to be less than perfect. The pressure is heavy: It requires a 90-point pace, which equates to 2.37 points per game, and doesn't allow much margin for error in terms of injury, fatigue or a longer tactical adjustment period.
Leicester's 2015-16 success is still the greatest Premier League champions' success of all time. The outsiders are the 5,000-to-1 favourite, who picked up 81 points in the process, ten ahead of Arsenal. They did a great job of mixing together elite counterattacking speed, great continuity, chemistry, unusually low injury rate and vast power underperformance.
It's more difficult to repeat now. The top clubs in England have bigger squads, recruitment processes, analytics teams and income to cover up. Where Newcastle United have improved financially, their spending power does not necessarily translate into the presence of an established title machine, as built as the Arsenal, City, Liverpool, Chelsea or Manchester United.
An outsider would have to have a top four quality starting lineup, minimal injuries, breakout performances, finishing and a few of their favorites underachieve. The odds weren't insurmountable and Leicester showed that. In modern economics, it is suggested that it is still very small.
Arsenal are the reigning champions, and with the strongest defensive base they could be relying on too many set-pieces and clean sheets to score 71 goals once more. City trailed a whopping seven points with 77 goals and a plus-42 margin, but if they can get back to their week-to-week consistency, that deficit could be erased. Liverpool will have the biggest task of all having slipped from 84 points in 2024-25 to 60 conceding 53.
Manchester United's third-placed 71-point haul was a step up, but 50 goals allowed was still a little out of the championship mould. So that should mean that by mid-season each serious contender for the Premier League title should be expected to be playing at a 90-point rate, with an elite goal difference and, crucially, a top-two finish over Christmas.
History provides a blue print, not a script. Injuries, tactical twists, margins for error and individual brilliance will still be the key factors in the EPL title game. But clubs that fall short of the standards are hoping for an unpredictable miracle, while those that reach the standards are crafting the winning machine.