Newcastle United top and West Ham bottom of Premier League table of improvers | OneFootball

We take a look at every Premier League club’s record this season compared to the same stage of last season. Oh dear Liverpool. But really oh dear West Ham.

1) NEWCASTLE UNITED +166.67% Games played: 21 Last season: 15 points; 18th position This season: 40 points; 3rd position

Last season, their 21st game was a win over Leeds United that was only their second of the season. This season, they were disappointed by a 1-1 draw with West Ham that denied them an 11th win. There has been a metric f***-tonne of money spent but also a lot of graft to get this far.

2) BRENTFORD +43.5% Games played: 21 Last season: 23 points, 15th position This season: 33 points, 7th position

The slide towards the relegation zone felt impossible as two months and nine games brought only one Premier League win last year. The recovery has been phenomenal and only Manchester United have more points since the World Cup.

3) ARSENAL +42.9% Games played: 20 Last season: 35 points; 5th position This season: 50 points; 1st position

Defeat to Everton aside, this has been a phenomenal season for Mikel Arteta’s Gunners; from Champions League chasers to odds-on favourites for the title via a handful of excellent signings and a whole lot of trust in the process.

4) BRIGHTON +21.4% Games played: 20 Last season: 28 points; 9th position This season: 34 points; 6th position

They lose their manager. They lose massive players. They get better. They need to bottle this sh*t because it is worth a fortune.

5) MANCHESTER UNITED +20% Games played: 21 Last season: 35 points; 7th position This season: 42 points; 3rd position

It’s easy to forget that a Manchester United side shorn of Ole Gunnar Solskjaer was actually in the middle of a run of just one defeat in 15 Premier League games that looked set to bring Champions League football. This season’s tactic of having an adult in charge from day one seems far more sensible.

It really doesn’t feel like Spurs are scoring goals, goals, goals but 28 goals in 22 games has become 41 goals in 22 games in a season that is always threatening to implode but which could actually be their best since peak Pochettino. Sort of.

7) ASTON VILLA +7.7% Games played: 21 Last season: 26 points, 10th position This season: 28 points, 11th position

Steven Gerrard – for all the mess he later made of this job – had managed to pull Aston Villa clear of a relegation battle and into mid-table at this juncture of last season. He has since gone and Unai Emery has repeated the trick.

8) CRYSTAL PALACE Games played: 21 Last season: 24 points, 13th place This season: 24 points, 12th place

No wins in their last five Premier League games has left Palace looking over their shoulders a little. The problem has been a lack of goals: 30 in 21 last season has become 19 in 21 this. They have not replaced those Conor Gallagher goals from midfield.

9) EVERTON -5.26% Games played: 21 Last season: 19 points, 16th place This season: 18 points, 18th place

Frank Lampard helped Everton survive but then left a side marginally worse than the one he took over last January. Sean Dyche took just a few days to make the Toffees believe that they are not doomed, starting with a 1-0 win over champions-elect Arsenal.

10) MANCHESTER CITY -15.1% Games played: 21 Last season: 53 points; 1st position This season: 45 points; 2nd position

Bringing in a goalscoring cheat code to somehow go backwards is oddly glorious. Erling Haaland has 25 Premier League goals but is he a burden to Manchester City?

11) LEEDS UNITED -18.18% Games played: 20 Last season: 22 points, 15th position This season: 18 points, 17th position

Leeds’ 19th and 20th games of last season were Marcelo Bielsa’s last wins as manager and kept the wolves from the door for the next six weeks. Leeds’ 19th and 20th games of this season brought just a point and the board panicked, even though this Leeds side is actually scoring more goals and conceding fewer. It’s not an easy job.

12) LEICESTER CITY -19.23% Games played: 21 Last season: 26 points, 12th position This season: 21 points, 14th position

Surprisingly, there is not an awful lot of difference in the goals being scored/conceded but Leicester have developed a rotten habit of throwing away points from winning positions. Brendan Rodgers will hope a better January has fixed that.

13) CHELSEA – 30.2% Games played: 21 Last season: 43 points, 2nd position This season: 30 points, 9th position

It’s been a sh*t-show that cost Thomas Tuchel his job and could yet do the same for Graham Potter, who has been handed a lot of very expensive trinkets to turn this sinking boat around.

14) LIVERPOOL – 31% Games played: 20 Last season: 42 points, 3rd position This season: 29 points, 10th position

Liverpool might argue they have a game in hand but you wouldn’t bet on them to walk away from a game in hand with anything more than a 3-0 drubbing. So they are the Big Six side with the biggest fall, despite losing only one key player in the summer transfer window and ‘gaining’ quite a few more. It’s a mess.

15) SOUTHAMPTON -37.5% Games played: 21 Last season: 24 points, 12th position This season: 15 points, 20th position

Ralph Hasenhuttl’s Southampton were capable of a run of ten games featuring just one defeat last winter. Nathan Jones’ Southampton have lost six of seven. It was a bizarre appointment that has gone pretty much as predicted.

16) WOLVES -41.17% Games played: 21 Last season: 34 points, 8th position This season: 20 points, 15th position

This is bizarre because it never really felt like Wolves were that good (better than Brentford this season, for context) last season, though eight of their 10 wins had come by a single goal so the margins were very, very slim. As those started to go against Wolves – despite a significant summer outlay – Bruno Lage paid with his job. Ten points from six games under Julen Lopetegui is a definite improvement.

17) WEST HAM -48.65% Games played: 21 Last season: 37 points, 4th position This season: 19 points, 16th position

Points have been almost halved and the goals scored have been more than halved, despite Gianluca Scamacca and Lucas Paqueta being added in the summer. It now feels very, very improbable that the Hammers would score nine goals in three games, though defensively they should have enough to stay up this season.