Last season, the Premier League delivered a level of competition that the English top flight had not seen in more than two decades. A striking set of statistics tells the story.

The gap between top and bottom narrows

Since the Premier League shrank to 20 clubs in 1995-96, the points distance between the top four and the bottom three had grown season by season — a reflection of elite clubs cashing in on European football and finishing higher year after year. That trend reversed sharply in 2025-26, when the gap fell to just 26 points, down from 44 points in 2024-25 and the smallest margin recorded in 23 years — since 25 points separated the top and bottom in 2002-03.

European places became genuinely attainable for clubs that would once have been considered long shots. Aston Villa clinched a Champions League spot despite accumulating one fewer point than they had managed when finishing seventh the previous season — this time, that total was good enough for fifth. Liverpool took the fifth and final Champions League berth with just 60 points, the lowest total for a side finishing in that position in 19 years, and a tally that would have placed them ninth in 2024-25.

Bournemouth qualified for European competition for the first time in their history. Sunderland returned to Europe for the first time in more than 50 years. Both clubs benefited from a season in which the points threshold for a European finish was unusually low.

Mid-table sides earn more respect

The improvement was not confined to the upper half of the table. Everton finished 13th — a position that frustrated their supporters — yet the points tally attached to that finish was the highest for a side in 13th place since the Toffees themselves achieved it at the turn of the millennium. The four positions directly below Everton also produced their highest points totals in 23 years. West Ham United were relegated in 18th place but gathered more points than any side finishing there since 2010-11.

In total, 13 of the 20 clubs ended the season with between 40 and 60 points — the most in a single Premier League campaign since 2003-04, which also produced 13 teams in that band.

Why did competition increase?

Whether the improvement reflected smaller clubs getting sharper or bigger clubs dropping off is difficult to say with certainty. The rise of analytically minded clubs such as Brighton, Brentford, and Bournemouth — combined with the spending power that now allows even bottom-half sides to recruit talent from abroad — points toward a genuine improvement at the lower end. Yet the fact that promoted play-off winners Sunderland finished above 13 established Premier League clubs in their first season back raises questions about whether the league's upper tier was as strong as usual.

Four of the seven clubs that finished in the top seven in 2024-25 — champions Liverpool, Chelsea, Newcastle United, and Nottingham Forest — collectively dropped 79 points between them last season. Sunderland and Leeds United, meanwhile, outperformed the promoted sides they replaced by a combined 64 points.

The result is an unusual dynamic heading into 2026-27: Bournemouth, Brighton, and Sunderland face European campaigns this season, while Chelsea, Tottenham Hotspur, and Newcastle United do not.

The cost of competition at the bottom

There is one area where greater overall competition has produced a harsher outcome — at the foot of the table. Historically, one club tended to be cut adrift well before the season's end. Now two sides routinely finish far behind the rest.

Since 1995-96, only two 19th-placed clubs failed to reach 30 points in the first 21 seasons of the 20-team era. Over the last decade, seven of the 10 sides finishing in 19th place have failed to reach that threshold. In each of the past two seasons, the second-bottom club — Ipswich Town in one campaign and Burnley in the other — finished with just 22 points, the lowest tally ever recorded by a side in that position.

Relegation battles have increasingly become a contest for the single remaining spot in the bottom three, with the other two places often decided long before the final day — frequently at the expense of newly promoted sides. Coventry City, Ipswich Town, and Hull City will arrive in the Premier League this season hoping to follow the example set by Sunderland and Leeds United, and prove that promotion need not end in an immediate return journey.