Premier League Mid Season Review - Part 5

With the Premier League season more than well and truly underway, it is time to have a look at each club and how they're doing and where they're on (or off!) course to finish.

Tottenham
At the time of writing, Spurs sit in 4th place, 3 points above 5th placed Everton after a dull 0-0 draw away at QPR. Tottenham's main objective has to be Champions League football and obviously so far they have left themselves in a good position to achieve this. The one thing I would point out however is that they were in a very similar position this time last year and fell away slightly, albeit with some unfortunate luck that Chelsea winning the Champions League meant they fell just short. 

Since their demolition in the North London derby they have gone on a good run and picked up many points. They won all their games in December apart from a loss at Everton which is no embarrassment this season. They won all those games rather comprehensively too, especially the 3-0 win at Fulham. Spurs do however have a really tough run of games coming up soon including Man Utd, a tricky cup tie at Leeds or Birmingham, Norwich who seem to be their bogey team and West Brom. If they can pick up a few points there and remain where they are after those games then that will put them in a really good position to ensure Champions League football come the end of the season.

Premier League Mid Season Review - Part 4

With the Premier League season more than well and truly underway, it is time to have a look at each club and how they're doing and where they're on (or off!) course to finish.

Southampton
Southampton currently sit in 17th place and are only out of the relegation zone on goal difference. They do however have a game in hand which could give them a nice little gap between them and the drop. So far this season they haven't done too bad considering they're a newly promoted team. If you look at Reading who are 5 points behind them and don't have a game in hand then you would say they were in a much worse position than the saints. I'm sure that Adkins will be pleased to be keeping up so far as staying out the relegation zone for as long as possible helps, especially for team morale. 

Premier League Mid Season Review - Part 3

With the Premier League season more than well and truly underway, it is time to have a look at each club and how they're doing and where they're on (or off!) course to finish.

Newcastle
Newcastle have had a disastrous first half of their season so far. At the time of writing, they are languishing down in 15th place, a mere 2 points above the relegation zone. This season has been so different from their last campaign it's almost laughable as they have plummeted from Champions League contenders to relegation candidates if they don't sort it out! In my opinion, apart from Demba Ba, none of their best players from last season have shone anywhere near as much as they did last season. This was evident in the fact that Ba got an offer from Chelsea which he took with open arms as he probably felt Newcastle were sinking and wanted to abandon ship.

Premier League Mid Season Review - Part 2

With the Premier League season more than well and truly underway, it is time to have a look at each club and how they're doing and where they're on (or off!) course to finish.

Fulham
Fulham have been consolidating their position in the Premier League for a number of seasons now and tend to finish mid table and comfortably stay up. This season is a little different however, they have been all over the place and sit in 13th place at the time of writing. In my opinion, they have been underperforming all season and without Dimitar Berbatov's heroics, could be in a bit of bother. They are only 6 points above the relegation zone and that is by no means a huge margin at all. I think Martin Jol and his men will be nervously looking over their shoulder in the coming weeks as they hope to avoid slipping further down the league. 

Premier League Mid Season Review - Part 1

With the Premier League season more than well and truly underway, it is time to have a look at each club and how they're doing and where they're on (or off!) course to finish.

Arsenal
It's been a strange season so far for Arsene Wenger's men, there have been numerous ups and downs throughout. They're hanging around just below the Champions League spots currently and if you go by the table then they have seen a big improvement in recent times. Before their draw with Southampton on New Years Day they had won their last 4 games in a row and were looking good, scoring an abundance of goals. Scoring goals has certainly not been a problem for them with 16 in their last 5 games.

However, 35% of Arsenal's goals have been scored or assisted by Theo Walcott and rumours are rife that he isn't going to be there much longer after stalling in his contract talks. Arsene Wenger seems to have finally unleashed him and let him begin to reach his full potential after allowing him to play the more central role in the team. I think so far this season he has been the key to their successful runs like this recent one. Before their good run of form they've had recently barring the Southampton game they were languishing down in 10th position at one point which is unthinkable for a club of their stature. During this rather gloomy period that contained a 2-0 loss at home to Swansea and an embarrassing defeat to lowly Bradford in the League Cup, Walcott wasn't really firing or playing well and this is what they missed. Cazorla seemed to be their only consistent performer however he looked lonely at times and struggled to carry the whole team on his back, he needed help. The return of Wilshere was also a massive boost and whilst he defends robustly, he also has much to offer going forward and combines with Cazorla brilliantly. 

Does Money Guarantee Success In Football?

After Manchester City rose to fame by being taken over by Arab Billionaires and won the league last season with an entirely different squad to that of 10 years ago, it begs the question - Does money guarantee success?

I have compiled a table which details each club that is currently in the Premier League and it's net spend. For the less economically knowledgeable, this is basically how much a club has spent - how much a club has received. (Both of these are in terms of transfers). This table has taken into account the last 20 years and goes back all the way to the 1992/1993 season. I have filled in the clubs who have make a loss in red and those who have ended up making a profit in green. I have also ranked each club in terms of their net spend so the club with the highest net spend and the biggest loss is rank 20 (Chelsea) and the club with the biggest profit and lowest net spend is rank 1 (Norwich).

The first thing that stands out is that both Norwich and Reading have ended up receiving more money for selling players than they have spent to buy them. In this day and age I think this it quite an achievement. A special mention to Swansea who narrowly missed out and have a net spend of £0.6m.

The main focus of this article was to analyse whether by a club spending huge amounts of money on players they would be guaranteed to enjoy success.