In August, it seemed optimistic to place Nottingham Forest even 14th in the Premier League. In September, we thought Brighton or Tottenham Hotspur were among the top five teams in England.
In November, we still thought Spurs were top-five contenders, and even more damning, we thought Manchester United deserved a midtable spot. (Silly us.) In January, we all boarded the AFC Bournemouth train.
If you keep track of semi-regular power rankings for long enough, you’ll realize how quickly one’s perceptions can shift over the course of a ridiculously long season. And, in a year in which both the title and relegation battles were over by May, we reach the final stretch of the 2024-25 Premier League season, with Newcastle United and Aston Villa rising and Forest falling back to where they began the season. (We also envision a postseason playoff.)
The following are our final updated power rankings for the 2024-25 season, followed by an analysis of the most significant changes since our previous rankings in January.
Newcastle and Villa are flying high, Manchester City has been stuck at No. 4 for a while, everyone has been great and terrible at times, and Forest has stumbled in an extremely predictable manner.
The updated Premier League team rankings
We last did this in January, and our rerankings, which combine Bill Connelly and Ryan O’Hanlon’s individual rankings, are listed alongside the new May adjustments, as well as each team’s current Premier League points total and goal differential. Here is our final reranking of the 2024-25 Premier League season.
Better late than never from Newcastle and Aston Villa
Imagine the Premier League had a season-ending playoff system similar to the Belgian Pro League; after the regular-season round-robin, everyone’s point totals are cut in half, and the top six teams compete in an additional round-robin to determine the league champion.
Granted, this does not work for a 20-team league (Belgium has 16) — that’s a 38-game regular season followed by 10 more games — but we can do whatever we want in a thought experiment.
Using analyst Simon Tinsley’s full-season projections and rounding odd numbers up, a six-team Premier League playoff would begin with Liverpool at 44 points, Arsenal at 37, Manchester City and Newcastle at 35, and Chelsea and Aston Villa at 33. It would still take a massive comeback to catch Liverpool, but given current form, Newcastle and Aston Villa could round out a post-playoff top three.
Newcastle have only lost one of their last ten matches in all competitions, and that loss came against Villa, who have only lost three of their last fifteen. Since March 8, only these two teams have averaged more than 2.0 points per game in league play (Villa at 2.63; Newcastle at 2.44), and they aren’t exceeding any of their underlying numbers. They’ve simply been two of, at worst, the league’s top three teams.
Newcastle is first in goals scored and third in goals allowed during this time period, while Villa is the inverse: third in goals and first in goals allowed. They have risen accordingly in our power rankings.
Newcastle’s wing pairing of Jacob Murphy (right) and Harvey Barnes (left) has been on fire since March 8, scoring seven goals and providing seven assists.
Barnes has replaced Anthony Gordon on the left side of the attack, and with 13 combined goals and assists this season, he is close to matching the 14 he scored in 1,100 more minutes at Leicester City in 2022-23.
He has also completed 74 progressive carries during this time, ranking second on the team and fifth in the league among non-defenders. Barnes, combined with Alexander Isak’s continued brilliance, has given Newcastle’s ultra-direct attack new life at a time when other teams’ energy levels in the league have waned.
Meanwhile, Villa’s success has been built on a combination of increasingly strong defense and attacking reinforcements from the bench. During this brilliant run, their possession rate has been 41.4% (16th in the league), and they’ve averaged only 29.3 touches in the attacking third (18th).
However, while they allow opponents to take as many shots as they want (since March 8, they have allowed 0.16 shots per possession, ranking 17th), none are from good positions. They allow only 0.11 expected goals (xG) per shot, the lowest in the league.
Villa counter-attacks well once they have properly absorbed pressure, especially late in a game. From the 70th minute onward, they’ve scored seven goals (the most in the league) while allowing only one.
In the January transfer window, Emery added Marcus Rashford (on loan) and Donyell Malen (€23 million), allowing him to shuffle his attackers and make valuable substitutions, with Malen accounting for two of those seven late goals.
Both teams required this late surge. As of March 8, Villa was seventh in the league with 45 points, while Newcastle was eighth with 44. Newcastle had lost four of their six league games, including 6-0 defeats to Liverpool and Manchester City, while Villa had gone five games without a win. They are now both among the top ten teams in the world, according to the Opta supercomputer.
Newcastle’s chances of finishing in the top five have increased to 95%, according to both Opta and Tinsley; Villa’s are between 37% (Tinsley) and 42% (Opta). And those odds do not account for the fact that their final two matches are against Europa League finalists Tottenham Hotspur (May 16) and Manchester United (May 25), on opposite sides of the final. They could benefit from distraction in both cases. — Connelly
Manchester City never really found fifth gear
I believe we all expected Manchester City to figure it out at some point, correct? Want to start scoring goals for fun? To shut things down on the other end? To control, suffocate, and dominate games, as they have for almost a decade?
Instead, there are two games remaining in the season, and City is only two points (and some goal differential) away from missing out on the Champions League entirely. They’re unlikely to miss out — Tinsley’s projections give City a 95% chance of finishing in the top five — but there is still a chance they won’t.
According to Transfermarkt, City spent €218 million on transfer fees for five players in January, while no other club in Europe paid more than €55 million. With all those new players on board, here’s how they’ve performed since the beginning of February, based on their adjusted goal difference (a blend of 70% xG and 30% goals):
And here’s how things looked before the start of February:
The numbers improved slightly, moving from plus-0.54 to plus-0.61 and from fifth to fourth best. However, City did not return to form as a Premier League and Champions League challenger, as Liverpool did near the end of both of their down years under Jurgen Klopp, 2020-21 and 2022-23, respectively. This was a team that was on the verge of being in the top four, but it is now slightly less so.
Now, the defense has significantly improved. Prior to February, their adjusted goals-allowed number was 1.41 per game, but it has since dropped to 0.96. City has allowed nearly five fewer shots per game (13.3 before February vs. 8.0 since), as well as significantly tougher shots (0.11 xG per shot vs. 0.14 previously). The press has been a little more aggressive and effective now that they’ve added some younger legs to the lineup.
But it has come at a significant cost on the other end. The City’s adjusted-goal total has dropped from 1.96 per game before February to 1.57 per game since. Prior to February, they attempted 17.2 shots per game, which was only slightly behind Liverpool’s league-leading 17.7. However, since February, the number has dropped to 13.8, and the shot quality has not improved at all.
So, basically, they are exchanging one type of instability for another. Before the January window, City could attack but not defend. And now they can only defend, not attack. In the recent Southampton game, City struggled to generate quality attempts despite facing a team with no motivation (according to City defender Rúben Dias, they “didn’t even try”).
All of this means that City cannot guarantee a win in their remaining games, particularly against tricky midtable teams such as Fulham and Bournemouth. This is still not a team capable of tilting the field to the point where their opponent falls off the opposite end.
They’ll most likely finish in the top five because they have a points and goal difference advantage, but if the team is to reclaim Premier League title contention next season, a lot will have to change. They are currently not even close to Liverpool or Arsenal. — O’Hanlon
Nottingham Forest couldn’t outrun xG forever
Nottingham Forest defeated Manchester United 1-0 on April 1, less than six weeks ago. It included a 0-0 draw against Arsenal and a 1-0 victory over Manchester City, extending a crucial unbeaten streak to four games. With eight games remaining, Forest was in third place with 57 points, eight ahead of fourth-place Chelsea, nine ahead of fifth-place City, and, most importantly for Champions League qualification, ten points ahead of sixth-place Newcastle.
Six matchdays later, they sit seventh. After blowing two separate leads in a 2-2 draw against relegated Leicester City on Sunday, they are now a point behind in the race for a top-five spot, and the way they’ve been playing, that gap feels much larger. They’ve won just one of their last seven games across all competitions, and only one of their last six in the Premier League. If there was ever a time to use the term “collapse,” it is now.
However, it’s only a partial collapse. Looking at the advanced stats, it was clear that Forest was running extremely hot. It was only a matter of whether they could secure a Champions League spot before returning to earth. That now appears unlikely.
On April 1, Forest had 50 goals (sixth in the league) on shots worth 38.0 xG (15th). Their goal differential was plus-15 (fourth), despite an xG differential of plus-1.8 (10th). They had won five league matches with a negative xG differential, and they had stolen eight points from nine matches with an xG differential of minus-0.75 or worse, with two wins and two draws.
Meanwhile, they had won nine out of nine matches with a plus-0.75 xG differential or better. They had certainly produced some outstanding performances, with players such as Murillo and Chris Wood — the league’s leading xG overachiever (he’s scored 20 league goals from shots worth 12.4 xG) — ranking among the league’s best.
After finishing 16th and 17th the previous two seasons, even a jump to around 10th would have been impressive. However, they had as many minus-0.75 performances as plus-0.75s, which is not a Champions League-worthy statistical resume.
On paper, Forest should be closer to Everton and Manchester United than Chelsea and Manchester City, and unfortunately for them, reality is finally catching up. Forest’s form has certainly deteriorated during this awful six-match swing; however, they have still managed to outperform against xG, stealing a 2-1 win over Spurs (xG differential: minus-1.7) and a 1-1 draw with Palace (minus-1.6) in this span. However, since April 2, they have ranked 15th in points per game (0.83) and 17th in xG differential (-5.6). They’ve hit a brick wall, but it’s not that surprising.
Of course, the story isn’t over yet. Forest face West Ham this weekend, a team in similar form to them, before hosting Chelsea in their final game. That could be a Champions League play-in game, and Chelsea will be without suspended forward Nicolas Jackson, whose absence is usually noticeable. (Chelsea averages 1.89 points per game when Jackson starts, and 1.50 when he does not.)
Forest would only need a few more breaks to make their long-awaited return to the Champions League, which they won in 1979 and 1980 (when it was known as the European Cup), but it’s possible that they’ve already run out of good breaks. — Connelly
Everyone in the middle’s been great and terrible at some point
Don’t look now, but Brentford has moved up to eighth place. And, while the table doesn’t show it, this weekend’s FA Cup finalists, Crystal Palace, may be even better, as they are currently eighth in the season-long adjusted goal difference table. More importantly, these two clubs are the biggest movers in the most recent edition of these rerankings.
We’ve also been enamored with a number of other mid-table clubs this season. Brighton’s talented young players and manager produced impressive results week after week. We’ve been very optimistic about Fulham.
We’ve liked what Everton has done since David Moyes returned. We like what the Wolves are doing right now. We rode the forest train until it ran out of steam. And we once tipped Bournemouth as a Champions League contender.
The point is that the Premier League’s midtable is stacked, and it’s been overshadowed by the awful relegated sides, Liverpool’s march to the title, and the struggles of almost every other big club.
However, I believe that the fact that there are fewer “gimme” matches than ever before has contributed to the struggles of most of the big clubs this year. Add Villa to the list above, and you have nine teams other than the traditional Big Six and Newcastle who have been genuinely difficult to play against this season, at least at times.
This isn’t just a subjective experience.
The Club Elo ratings evaluate clubs solely on their results. There are no league adjustments, underlying data sources, or anything similar. You win games and gain rating points. Losing a game means losing points. And the number of points you win or lose is determined by the opponent’s quality (based on their previous wins and losses) and the game’s location.
According to these rankings, Villa is the world’s 11th-strongest team, with Palace 16th and Brentford 17th, sandwiched below Napoli and above Borussia Dortmund. Then there’s Bournemouth in 20th place, one spot behind Roma and one ahead of Juventus. Forest is 22nd, trailing Juventus and ahead of AC Milan.
Brighton is one spot below Milan. Manchester United has slipped to the bottom of the top 25 thanks to their performance in the Europa League.
To put it another way, the Premier League teams ranked sixth, seventh, eighth, ninth, tenth, twelfth, and sixteenth are all among the world’s top 25.
When it comes to the top 50, Tottenham (31), Everton (33), Fulham (34), West Ham (41), Wolves (44), and the two automatic qualifiers from the Championship, Burnley (47) and Leeds (49), all make the cut. If team strengths were evenly distributed across the five largest countries, each league would have eight or nine teams, with some room for the best teams in the Netherlands and Portugal.
Instead, the Premier League has 17 teams in the top 50 and that number will shoot up to 19 next season. Although the top seems weaker — and I’m not sure it actually is, as Liverpool and Arsenal rank No. 1 and No. 2 in Club Elo — the league as a whole is stronger than ever before. And it’s only going to get harder next season. — O’Hanlon
