Predicting the final table for the 2023-24 Premier League season

It’s not interesting, or exciting, and frankly we’d like to see some variety. Manchester City has won five of the last six Premier League titles. This year, the blue side of Manchester has a couple teams vying for the title, and City has not had the chance to sit atop the table comfortably, and it is too soon for a coronation. However, Pep and company weathered injuries to Kevin De Bruyne and Erling Haaland. Until Man City doesn’t win the Premier League, predicting anybody else feels overly bold.

The one team in the last six seasons to best City? That would be Liverpool. Jurgen Klopp’s club has finished second twice in that time to Manchester City, and Klopp has said he plans to leave Liverpool after the season. Liverpool has been stellar, and spent time atop the table, even with injuries. There was one key loss, though, that leaves us picking them to be the proverbial bridesmaids once more.

That Liverpool loss that gave us pause? It was a 3-1 defeat to Arsenal. So why are the Gunners our pick to finish third? Well, aside from memories of Arsenal bottling it last season, the club has less talent and a less proven manager. Proven commodities earn more trust for a reason. If the Gunners were in first with a few points to work with, maybe we’d consider a loftier prediction. That’s not the case, though.

After the top three, there is a real step down, and we thought for a second about having an impressive club outside the usual parameters of the top of the table rounding out the top four. However, Son Heung-Min is as good, or better, than anybody on any of the other teams in the Premier League. Also, Ange Postecoglou has a chance to get things situated and, hopefully, improved defensively. Otherwise, we’re not so sure about this one.

At prediction time, Villa is fourth in goal differential, and is definitely a threat to finish in the top four. We see the Birmingham club finishing no worse than fifth. Unai Emery is kind of the perfect manager if you want to get a B+ performance out of B-level talent (which is why he has won the UEFA Cup/Europa League, but not so much the Champions League). Villa also, by dint of being in the Premier League, has more money than 90 percent of European clubs, with a roster that speaks to that. It’s just that, well, 10 percent of those other clubs include the clear top three in the league, and Spurs has been here more often.

You don’t want to react too much to one weekend in football, but you may recall recently Aston Villa comfortably beat Nottingham Forest the same day Manchester United flubbed it against Fulham. That sealed this prediction in. United is a mess. The club has misused its resources, and Erik ten Hag just can’t get things on track for more than a month at a time. Sixth isn’t bad, but it isn’t up to Man U’s standards.

A simple influx of cash can only do so much. Newcastle made a surprise top-four finish last year, but Champions League football did not help the club solidify itself up there with, say, Man City or PSG. The issue for Newcastle has been health. So many key players have missed so much time. In the end, though, we think enough important players will be healthy for enough games for the club to finish seventh.`

The Brighton magic was bound to take a dip. When Graham Potter left, Roberto De Zerbi stepped in as manager and kept the success going. However, the loss of Alexis Mac Allister and Moises Caicedo may have proven tougher to overcome, though Pascal Gross is having quite the season. All that said, dropping from sixth to eighth is far from a disaster, especially for a club that has only reached the “Premier League mainstay” level a couple seasons ago.

Todd Boehly and company have shelled out so much money. Most of it would have been used equally well being lit on fire. Chelsea’s constant churn of new names, and new managers, has not yielded much success. This is a mid-table roster at Champions League prices, and there is no sign of that changing.

Wolves is the picture of “mid-table team.” It will probably finish somewhere between ninth and 11th, with a goal differential around even. Gary O’Neil seems to have brought stability as manager, and the club is no longer a repository of second-tier Portuguese players. If nothing else, Wolverhampton beat Manchester City this season. Not many teams are going to be able to say that.

The vibes are bad at West Ham. Fans vociferously want David Moyes out as manager. The club was comfortably beaten by Manchester United and smashed by Arsenal in February. Things are heading in the wrong direction. That being said, the Hammers did enough early on that they won’t sniff relegation, and we have them finishing 11th.

Well, given Fulham used to be a yo-yo club and always had to sweat relegation, being a shrug of a mid-table club isn’t too shabby. Those three points squeezed out of Man U definitely help, and it also memorably beat Arsenal on New Year’s Eve. Of course, Fulham still has more losses than wins, so clearly those results are not the norm.

After Fulham, we see another drop in talent and results. Well, aside from a certain team that suffered a point deduction we will get to later. Brentford is well-run, well-managed, and cares about analytics. When the Bees finished ninth in the 2022-23 season, it seemed like they might follow in Brighton’s footsteps. Alas, the talent is still, you know, the talent. Given the way the club is run from the top down, though, we trust Brentford can finish 13th.

Shout out to Dominic Solanke, one of the top goal scorers in the Premier League. Even so, Bournemouth is on the fringes of the bottom five in goals scored, and also goals against. The latter Solanke can’t do much about, of course. Thus, you can argue Bournemouth has been lucky, but that “luck” is banked. The Cherries may be worse down the stretch, but not enough to really threaten relegation.

The Toffees certainly can’t be called lucky. Due to financial misdeeds, as interpreted by the Premier League, Everton got a 10-point deduction. That had them in a dicey spot, but then, a (slight) reprieve! Everton's deduction was, well, deducted, from 10 to six. We think, in the games left, Everton’s talent will earn enough results to avoid relegation, but Toffee fans are surely frustrated that’s even in the cards.

Do new managers give a club a boost? If you believe in that, you believe Crystal Palace will avoid relegation. Roy Hodgson, a longtime, oft-retread manager, resigned, paving the way for Oliver Glasner to take over. At this point in time, there’s likely more energy to be found in Glasner. Indeed, in his first game in charge, Palace beat Burnley 3-0. Even if the manager bounce is minimal, it has us giving Crystal Palace the 16th spot in the table.

Just avoiding relegation, we have Forest. The bottom-two teams in the table are locked in. Their relegation is a fait accompli at this point. That just leaves the final spot. Forest has been in the Premier League for a couple years. The team we have finishing 18th has not. Thus, Forest gets the edge.

The thing is, Luton Town did not get promotion through crushing the competition in the Championship. Luton was third in the table, fourth in goal differential, and earned its spot through the playoffs. Their financial outlay is the lowest in the Premier League. Captain Tom Lockyer, in a scary moment, suffered cardiac arrest on the pitch. Luton has been the best of the promoted teams, but that is a surprise. If it stayed up, that would be cool. We’ll admit we’d like to see it. We just don’t think we will.

Burnley actually did crush the competition in the Championship. Vincent Kompany’s club had 101 points and a plus-52 goal differential. Kompany’s Burnley played in the style employed by his former manager Pep Guardiola at Manchester City. The problem is Burnley tried to keep that style of play in the Premier League, and with the talent difference has routinely had its doors blown off. Well, at least back in the Championship next season that style should work again.

Yes, as you may have surmised, we have all three teams that were promoted prior to the 2023-24 season going right back down. Frankly, picking Sheffield to finish last is the prediction we have the most confidence in. Only Burnley really has any chance of falling below them, and Burnley has a comfortably better goal differential and was a force in the Championship last season. Granted, that was a while ago now, but it’s also more than we can say about Sheffield, a team that has truly looked woeful, and a club that has already fired a manager.