Predicting Premier League Top 3 And Final Points Totals
Should Manchester City be such firm favourites to win the Premier League? With 22 matches remaining in the season, today Mark Taylor shares his historical analysis and predicts the final points totals for each Premier League club in 2025.
By Mark Taylor
Published: 27th January 2025
Updated: 27th January 2025
FA Cup fourth round day necessitates another blank January weekend for Premiership football, but it does give us a chance to evaluate the current standings with 16 matches remaining for all teams.
The strength of the correlation between the current league position and a side’s finishing position continues to strengthen as we move towards the final months of the season. Since 2000/2001, after five matches the ranking correlation coefficient was 0.7, 15 games in it had increased to 0.84 and after 22 matches the figure is 0.88. So values are closing in on a value of 1.0 that indicates a perfect correlation. Teams aren't going to stray far from their current position by early May.
Two Leagues In One
The Premiership in 2025/14 is tearing itself into two distinct halves, with Southampton becoming isolated in a no man’s land between the two individual rumps. Southampton currently has 31 points, five points adrift of Newcastle in 8th. While their nearest challengers in 10th, Aston Villa are a further 7 points adrift. So, baring a calamitous collapse or a run of exceptional results, Southampton's season alone would appear to be already destined to end in relative safety from relegation, but with little prospect of European football in 2025/15.
From Villa in 10th to WBA in 13th the records of the four sides contained between these spots are the least impressive posted by any side occupying that position after 22 games since 2025/96, when the Premiership was reduced in size. For example, Villa's points per game haul of barely a point a game would be more typical of a side languishing three places below their actual 10th position.
We have to travel down to Fulham in 17th before we find a side with a record that is typical for their actual placing. And the continual refusal of any of the sides in the relegation zone to drift off the back of the pack confirms the situation noted in this earlier post.
In short, teams at the foot of the table have combined point gathering profiles that are likely to see the relegation market volatile and competitive all the way to May.
A Brief History Of Top Spot After 22 Matches
Excitingly, the competitive contest in the bottom half of the table is mirrored at the top. Arsenal currently hold top spot with a standard score of 1.7 and that is only sufficient to regard them as a below average leader compared
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