POWER RANKINGS - April 2025 Edition

Ranking the big 7 PL clubs based on current/recent form

I love rankings. It is a good chance to write up many of the thoughts I have about the teams in the Premier League when I don’t have a bigger point that I want to talk about for them.

It has been too long since I revisited this topic and I have a lot of thoughts on these teams.

If you want to hear me talk with Elliot Smith about this, I also did a podcast with him for Arsenal Vision Patrons.

9 - Tottenham

Previously: 6th

I do not believe in Tottenham and I have been on this train for a while. The numbers when you look at them in the aggregate are not bad! They have the 8th best goal difference, they have the 11th best xG difference. They have 5th most goals scored and the 6th most expected goals.

That’s not nearly as good as they would want from their expectations at the start of the season but normally a team like that is mediocre midtable team. They sort of look like Fulham or Brentford who are in 9th and 11th respectively.

You look at things a bit more beyond the zipped up numbers and you can why this team is in this spot.

One of the hallmarks of a bad team is inconsistency and that is an apt description of Tottenham. They can have good performances, but they have been sandwiched between some bafflingly bad performances.

This is a team that has been hit with injuries pretty hard this season but even with that, it is hard to imagine them going from a starting point of a top 4 to 6 team to 16TH!

I am not normally a believer in karma, but this does feel like that coming back around to them. Their fans rooted for their team not to win against Manchester City last season, and that was the difference for them finishing 5th and being in the Europa League, and them finishing ahead of Aston Villa and having the Champions League and all the extra budget that allows.

It seems to have also been the start of an unhealable rift between the fans and Ange Postecoglou. It doesn’t help that Ange seems to have been very dogmatic with his style during the worst of the injury crisis and put his team in a bad position; the overall trust and belief between the players, coach, and fans is probably shredded.

Becoming Spursy eventually comes for everyone.

8 - Manchester United

Previously: 8th

This is a ranking that is much more about Spurs being a dumpster fire than Manchester United actually being better than them.

In a single or two-legged match, I would still take Spurs to be able to beat Manchester United more often, they just started with higher expectations from me and they have fallen so much further, feeling even more hopeless right now.

Manchester United are just sad, and while I still enjoy being able to laugh at them, it is almost becoming a bit pathetic, and like you are picking on a sick animal that is struggling for life.

I used to look at the roster and think that while it was a mismatch and not well constructed, there was talent on this team, but it was less than the sum of its parts. Now I look at it, and outside of Bruno Fernandes, I struggle to see much positive there.

A good question to frame this is if they were to list all their players this summer, which ones would Manchester City, Liverpool, or Arsenal poach off of them?

It would be a very short list if it could even be a list with a single name or even no names on it.

To think that this is still one of the highest wage bill teams in the world is astonishing. They have spent so poorly and with such short-term thinking that they have put themselves in cap hell. It is going to be painful to bounce back from this.

The new manager bounce for them also never came. Looking at the performances here, can you tell where Ruben Amorin took over and they played meaningfully differently than they did under Eric Ten Hag?

They have some interesting youth players and they will probably need to lean into that more becuase it is so hard to imagine how they clear enough space to add in proper players to this group.

7 - Aston Villa

Previously: 4th

Nothing warms my little stats-filled heart like doing a bit of shade throwing on Aston Villa and Unai Emery.

This is a team that in all honesty, I like the construction of. I think that they have built a team that is balanced and full of talent throughout the squad. They have some players that I would like at Arsenal and it is a bit of a disappointment that they haven’t been able to fully turn this into a more consistent performance that could see them return to the Champions League next year.

Realistically with Manchester City having a down year, they should have been the team best positioned to capitalize and jump them. Third or Fourth place should have absolutley been theirs this season.

I guess they have an outside shot at it still, but they need to jump a number of teams to get there.

Like so many of the teams that are in the hunt for the top 5, they have too many flaws this season and that has turned into dropped points and inconsistent play. They have also just not been nearly as good or consistent as they were last season (before an end-of-season near collapse).

They are a team that has pushed the limits to build their team and they might be in a tough situation this summer without the Champions League money to top off the revenue numbers.

6 - Nottingham Forest

Previous: Not Included

They might make the Champions League but I think that they may have gotten here through a bit of smoke and mirrors.

There isn’t anything wrong with that, they timed their precious goals scored perfectly, having the 9th most goals scored from 15th most xG. They have overperformed their underlying numbers and when you do that you don’t have to give them back and it looks like they will have just enough room to squeeze into the top 5 and be one of the great stories of the season.

The early numbers about the team were actually very positive, especially considering their position the last two seasons.

They went from a team that looked like it was fighting relegation to consistently producing better chances than their opponents.

The last few months however, have not looked great, but they have done JUST enough to keep getting the points needed with goals coming at just the right time.

Over the last 10 matches played, they have looked closer to 15th best team than the 5th but again it might not matter for them if they can scrape another 5-7 points from Brentford, Crystal Palace, Leicester, West Ham and then a potentially massive final day match against Chelsea.

I am actually a bit intrigued to see how they back this up next season if they are able to make the Champions League. They have been ambitious in the market and now will have a slightly higher caliber of player available to them.

5 - Chelsea

Previously: 5th

I have taken much delight in Chelsea’s struggles this season.