That’s right, another Premier League Season has ended and that means it’s time for me to React to the Predictions I made back in July last year! These are my favourites articles to do because we simply get to laugh at how rubbish I am at predicting these sports that I spend hours upon hours watching! So sit back, and enjoy!
20th: Wolves
Well, I do remember this Prediction, and it hasn’t aged particularly well as Wolverhampton Wanderers finished 14th with a pretty good 46 points! The reason why I went with Wolves is because they couldn’t really sign anyone, but that seemed to help them for most of the season as Gary O’Neil did a great job pushing them along and Wolves even looked like they could challenge for Europe at one point. That fact shows how bad this Prediction was, but fair play to Wolves!
19th: West Ham
Deary, Deary Me, this is a bad one! West Ham United had a very positive final year under David Moyes as they finished 9th with a positive 52 points to their name! At the time of my Predictions, West Ham had just sold Declan Rice and hadn’t brought anyone in, hence why I had them to get Relegated. Of course, The Hammers brought in the likes of James Ward-Prowse, Edson Alvarez, and Mohammed Kudus and they’ve all definitely improved the team! So yeah, another bad one from me!
18th: Everton
That’s right, I didn’t have a single one of the newly Promoted Teams to get Relegated, and I was wrong about Everton as they came home 15th with the always-important 40 points. My reasoning for Everton was they’d only just survived the previous two seasons, and this was looking like a good shout for most of the year. However, The Toffees found good form towards the end of their campaign and they were able to comfortably stay up, even with a points deduction!
17th: Luton
Ah, I wasn’t too far off with this one, but Luton Town were ultimately relegated down in 18th with 26 points. I didn’t think Luton had the best squad at the start of the season, but I did fancy them to stay up due to their cosy home ground. To be fair, Luton played some pretty good games at Kenilworth Road, but it was unfortunately not enough for The Hatters who were officially Relegated on the final day! So yeah, not a terrible Prediction, but I was still wrong!
16th: Nottingham Forest
Again, I’m not too far off with this one as Nottingham Forest finished 17th with 32 points to their name! I said I wasn’t sure about the ability of Nottingham Forest, but I did say that I felt like they had the quality to improve given the players had gotten used to one another. Of course, they actually went backwards when it comes to both points and position, but they ultimately stayed up which is the most important thing!
15th: Sheffield United
This is not a good one as Sheffield United finished rock bottom in the Premier League (this year) with only 16 points (and just 3 wins)! I firstly said that Sheffield United would have “enough quality” to stay in the Premier League before I said they would be helped by their home crowd. At least The Blades were better at home than away! But seriously, this is a bad one, and I’m honestly glad I don’t need to write about Sheffield United for at least another year because it’s been painful at times!
14th: Bournemouth
AFC Bournemouth performed slightly better than I expected, finishing 12th with an impressive 48 points! I said that Bournemouth would be comfortably safe which is true and I also said that the decision to replace Gary O’Neil with Andoni Iraola was a good one. Again, that was the case, so whilst I may not have gotten the Prediction right, the working out around it was spot on!
13th: Crystal Palace
This was looking alright until Crystal Palace took off under Oliver Glasner to finish 10th with 49 points! I did say that Crystal Palace were definitely capable of finishing higher than 13th, but I wasn’t fully sure a full season would go under Roy Hodgson. Ultimately, it went fine, but it was Oliver Glasner’s appointment that soared The Eagles into a terrific top-half finish! To be honest, I’m not annoyed about this one being wrong!
12th: Brentford
I was worried I put Brentford too low at the start of the season, but I actually put them too high as they finished 16th with “only” 39 points. I said that Brentford would drop off a bit as a result of losing Ivan Toney, and that was true, but other injuries to another star player in the form of Bryan Mbeumo also didn’t help. I was also very wrong when I said that I wouldn’t be surprised to see The Bees finish in the Top 10, and yeah, not the best of seasons for Brentford, but they would’ve taken 16th in the Prem as a bad season any day of the week a few years ago!
11th: Fulham
I can’t lie, I’m very frustrated with Fulham this season as they finished 13th with 47 points. The reason I’m so frustrated with Fulham is because not only were they only 2 points off 10th, but they also could’ve finished a lot higher up had they shown some better consistency! I did say The Cottagers would have a similar points tally to last year, which was kind of right (47 compared to 52), so this isn’t at all a bad Prediction, but it’s definitely a frustrating one!
10th: Chelsea
For a while, this looked like a pretty good Prediction, but Chelsea’s superb end to the season meant they ultimately finished 6th with 63 points! My reasoning for Chelsea being 10th was because I didn’t rate Mauricio Pochettino particularly highly and I also thought that the squad had actually gone backwards from the season before which is saying something. Again, this was true for the large majority of the season, but in the end, it was proven to be incorrect due to The Blues' positive end to the campaign. So yeah, I was ultimately off the mark here!
9th: Tottenham
Speaking of off the mark, Tottenham Hotspur had a much better year than I anticipated as they scored 66 points on their way to 5th place! My main concern about Tottenham was Ange Postecoglou because Spurs had had much stronger managers in the past and struggled, but actually, I thought Ange had a really good first season and Spurs finishing only two points off a Champions League spot is very impressive. However, what makes this Prediction really bad is this was done before Harry Kane was sold, and I said that if Kane was sold, Tottenham would finish a lot lower! My oh my!
8th: Burnley
That’s it, this might be the worst Prediction I’ve made for quite some time! I had full belief that Burnley were a pretty well-run club that would work together extremely well, in a similar way to Brentford from a few years ago. However, none of this was the case as The Clarets lacked any sort of real quality and ended up getting Relegated with just 24 points! So yeah, all I have to say is this was incredibly bad!
7th: Brighton
In fairness to me, a lot of people got Brighton and Hove Albion wrong this year as they ultimately finished 11th with “just” 48 points. I expected Brighton to not be as good as last year given they had to focus on European Football, but I still expected them to be very hard to beat. However, that wasn’t really the case as The Seagulls lost more games than they won and they were simply nowhere near European Football in the end!
6th: Aston Villa
Aston Villa actually did better than I expected in terms of position as their 68 points was enough for 4th place! I said that Aston Villa’s squad had gotten stronger and that a whole year under Unai Emery could do wonders for them. However, I didn’t expect Villa to be this good and I certainly didn’t expect them to be in the Champions League positions for basically the entire season! But hey, that’s credit to Aston Villa, and the only negative you could say about their season is they should’ve had a lot more points!
5th: Liverpool
I have to say, I don’t really know why I didn’t think Liverpool would get back into the Champions League because that’s exactly what they did! I did say that Liverpool could easily finish in the Top 4 if things went well for them, and they did for the most part as they finished third with 82 points. This is a hard one to talk about because they simply did better than I expected, which is fair to The Reds!
4th: Newcastle
Newcastle United did not repeat another Top 4 finish as they came home 7th with 60 points! I thought Newcastle were just going to keep getting better as they signed new players and got closer to being a proper top team. However, that didn’t happen as The Magpies struggled for a while and the signing of Sandro Tonali did not work out one bit! However, Newcastle were still able to finish 7th, and if the FA Cup Final goes their way, another season in Europe can be seen as a success!
3rd: Manchester United
This one is bad! I said that Manchester United would close in on the Top 2, and instead, they completely dropped off and finished 8th (with 60 points!) I said that Mason Mount would prove to be a great signing (that definitely didn’t happen) and that Eric ten Hag would only get better (that also didn’t happen)! I also said that United wouldn’t be too far off the Title, and I think 31 points is very far off! So yeah, another bad one from me!
2nd: Manchester City
Once again, I didn’t back Manchester City to win the Premier League, and they went on and did it (again)! Part of the reason I didn’t back Man City winning again was because Ilkay Gundogan left, but you could argue that Josko Gvardiol stepped into that role quite nicely (in terms of scoring in the big games). I also said that City wouldn’t win because no team has ever won 4 English Top Flight Titles in a row, and all I’ll say to this is I will remember this when it comes to predicting the next Super Bowl Champions! So yeah, I clearly never learn when it comes to City!
1st: Arsenal
Whilst this was wrong, I wasn’t that far off as Arsenal finished second on 89 points, just 2 points off the Title! I said that the experience of missing out on the Title the year before would help them and they would improve simply because they’re a young side. In fairness, this happened as Arsenal did get more points than 12 months ago and they also finished closer to 1st, however, just not close enough to actually be first! Still, it was a good effort from Arsenal, but the same cannot be said for me as I somehow managed to not get a single thing correct!