The English Premier League season is done and dusted before the hearts and minds of the football world become engulfed by this year’s World Cup, it is time for reflection.
The 2025/26 season was a truly wild one with Arsenal ending their 22-year drought as champions, while their fiercest rivals Tottenham flirted with relegation until the final day of the season.
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The two north London clubs copped plenty of criticism across the course of the season, but in the end Arsenal certainly had the last laugh.
While Tottenham can breathe a big sigh of relief despite many pundits arguing that Spurs’ hierarchy deserved to face the drop following years of poor decision making.
Liverpool delivered a timid defence of the title they won in Arne Slot’s first season in charge.
Frustrations at Anfield have led to fingers being pointed at botched transfer windows as well as their Dutch manager, who suffered from a bad case of the second year blues.
Adding to the angst on Merseyside was the re-emergence of Manchester United.
The Red Devils turned the corner under now permanent boss Michael Carrick and the future is looking a lot brighter at Old Trafford.
Big six club Tottenham and Chelsea flopping once again allowed for middleweight clubs to surge up the table and secure European football for next season.
Here are the biggest talking points from the end of the Premier League season!
TOTTENHAM’S OWNERS DESERVED RELEGATION
Arguably the story of the season was Tottenham’s relegation battle.
Spurs avoided the drop with three wins and a draw in their final five games of the season.
Instead, London rivals West Ham are headed to the Championship, finishing two points behind Tottenham.
On the final day of the season West Ham fans mourned a disastrous campaign and projected their anger towards the club’s hierarchy at the London Stadium, chanting to them ‘you sold our soul for this s***hole’.
The shoe could have easily been on the other front.
Tottenham supporters celebrated that they would remain in the top flight with a 1-0 win against Everton and their $1 billion stadium, but Spurs fans have certainly not forgotten their frustrations with their club’s ownership.
Australian manager Ange Postecoglou was sacked at the beginning of the season despite ending the club’s 17-year trophy drought with a Europa League triumph because of finishing 17th in the Premier League.
Tottenham bosses stressed that with Champions League football secured they wanted to compete on all fronts rather than sacrifice one competition for the benefit of another like Postecoglou.
They certainly have egg on their faces now.
Postecoglou’s team was never seriously threatened with relegation like this season’s squad under Thomas Frank, Igor Tudor and Roberto De Zerbi were.
Tottenham made it to the Round of 16 in the Champions League before they were humbled by Atletico Madrid, but the reality of their campaign stood in stark contrast to the pre-season expectations placed on the club.
“Rewind to just over a year ago and Spurs released a video on the club’s YouTube channel in which (Daniel) Levy, the former chairman, and (Vinai) Venkatesham, the chief executive, went on a smarm offensive about their shared love of red wine and boldly declared: ‘We want to win the Premier League. We want to win the Champions League. We want to win.’,” The Telegraph’s Matt Law wrote.
“Had it not been for a João Palhinha goal and a stunning save from Antonin Kinsky against Everton on Sunday, then Tottenham might have been contemplating trying to win the Championship next season.
“Levy and Venkatesham’s sound bites proved to be nothing more than delusional drivel and both men should cringe with embarrassment if they ever watch it back. The video was released less than a month after Tottenham had sacked their first winner in 17 years and replaced him with a man who had never won a trophy and had never managed in the Champions League.
“If ever there was a wrong man at the wrong time, then it was Thomas Frank at Tottenham. He is a talented coach and an impressive individual, but Spurs were the worst fit possible for somebody who had come from such a settled and supportive environment at Brentford.
“Levy, Venkatesham and sporting director Johan Lange were delusional in their belief that Frank could somehow pick up where Ange Postecoglou had left off by winning the Europa League. They conveniently forgot the squad the Dane inherited had finished 17th in the Premier League table and had, along with supporters, been desperate for Postecoglou to stay.”
The final month of the season has been a sugar hit for Tottenham, but there is no hiding the reality of where they are at.
Back-to-back 17th place finishes without financially lucrative European football means they start 2026/27 under immense pressure.
“Is it too far to say that they’ve been pathetic? That they should be ashamed of themselves? Probably not,” Manchester United great Gary Neville said on Sky Sports.
Neville added: “Now they know for real, having escaped today, they can start to basically drive a bulldozer through that dressing room because that’s what they need to do.
“The actions out on the pitch speak a lot louder than words. To dare is to do - do they dare to do, these players? I don’t think so. Are they always together? No, I don’t think so.
“Is there a connection right through the club? No, we hear that the owners have been trying to sell this club for two or three, four years now, trying to get as high a price as possible.
“They’ve done a great job in certain ways with certain things that they’ve built, in infrastructure terms, but they failed the fans on the pitch - that is most important.
“There’s got to be a massive reset; there’s got to be an autopsy that goes really deep, right the way through the club.
“When you’re owners of a football club - and I’m an owner of a football club - sometimes you have to start by looking in the mirror yourself.
“Success sometimes doesn’t come in a football club because of the decisions that you [the owner] make, because of what you do. Not because of what the fans, what the players, or what the coaches do.
“I mean, appointing Igor Tudor and having to sack him within a few weeks - didn’t feel right, that appointment, from day one, did it? It just didn’t connect.
“Sacking Ange Postecoglou and bringing in Thomas Frank, someone who’s highly respected, bringing in Igor Tudor, now bringing De Zerbi in.
“What a rollercoaster of a season. [The owners] have lost a lot of credibility and trust. You can see the signs that are up against the owners and I’m not surprised.”
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LIVERPOOL TRANSFER PRESSURE AS SLOT IN THE GUN
After winning the title last season and winning their first five games of this campaign, Liverpool fans would have laughed at someone if they suggested the Reds would just cling onto a Champions League place late in the season.
Fifth-placed Liverpool’s season quickly suffered a downward spiral with new signings like Alexander Isak and Hugo Ekitike failing to make an immediate impact.
While Mohamed Salah’s form fell away, the Egyptian king fell out with Arne Slot and he farewelled Anfield on the final day of the season.
Liverpool are reportedly targeting 19-year-old RB Leipzig winger Yan Diomand as their Salah replacement.
It is one of several holes they need to fill in a team that was booed off the pitch multiple times in the second half of the season.
“There’s lots of things wrong with this Liverpool team. Nothing’s working or functioning going forward or defending. But the biggest thing that stands out for me that Liverpool have lost is the press,” Reds great Jamie Carragher said on Sky Sports in March.
“And pressing, for Liverpool, was not just a Jurgen Klopp thing; he took it to a completely different level than what we’ve seen Liverpool teams do in the past, there’s no doubt about that, but the whole point of people saying it’s tough going to Anfield is not because Liverpool are always amazing on the ball or have got the best players in the world, it’s because it’s a tight pitch, the crowd are on top of you and Liverpool get after you.
“That is something that is sorely lacking. For me, that is the biggest problem with Liverpool right now.
“I’ve been asking myself all season: is this down to the manager or is it the profile of the player?
“I think Liverpool’s hierarchy will be sat there thinking ‘We won the league last season, and when we recruited, we think we recruited better players than we had before’. You could argue that, talent-wise, but Liverpool are not a team - they are a team of individuals.
“Quality players, yes, but they’ve just been dropped in. There’s no cohesion. That’s what they’ve lost, and that is the most important thing for Liverpool.
“I never think of Liverpool as this fancy team with superstar players; it’s always been about top players, but being a team.”
Many supporters have pointed the finger at Slot, but multiple reports have stated that the Dutchman will keep his job.
Liverpool lost 20 games across all competitions this season - their worst tally this century.
Slot is reportedly going to be aided by the acquisition of Etienne Reijnen, who was his assistant at Feyenoord and is allegedly a set piece specialist.
Ballon d’Or winner and Liverpool great Michael Owen is “a little bit torn” on Slot’s future, however, and many Reds people feel the same way.
“To win the league in your first year, that should buy you a lot of points. But this year has been pretty poor,” Owen told The Mirror.
“I do feel sorry for him in a way that there have been injuries, and not all signings will be the manager’s.
“But I think the style of play is what is irking the Liverpool fans. They are used to being entertained in the last decade, they are used to high-energy... a lot of people use the word and even Mo Salah said it in his statement the other day, heavy metal type of football.
“And they are seeing more of a slow, boring... they are not on the edge of their seats at Anfield this season and it’s been pretty depressing. I would be, after winning the league, qualifying for the Champions League, hesitant to pull the trigger just yet.
“However, I understand people that say if things don’t change after 10 or 15 games next year, then the season is virtually written off and you have wasted another year. I do get that.
“But who is out there? I’m not sure. I would probably continue with him. Probably. But I would be easily swayed if things started badly next year.
“Then the problem is obviously all the good managers are snapped up at the start of the year, so then you are potentially looking at leftovers during the season, and that’s not a position that Liverpool want to be in.
“Come November or something, if they are making a change, it’s like, where do you go then?
“It’s almost like you’d write a year off and that’s the bit that’s niggling at the back of my mind.”
ARSENAL: HOW GUNNERS PREDICTED DROUGHT-BREAKING TITLE
Mikel Arteta’s side copped a lot of flack this season for their style of play.
‘Set Piece FC’ was the moniker routinely thrown away as a result of their strength from corners and free kicks.
Others were a lot harsher in their criticism.
“Earlier this year, Paul Scholes said they would be the “worst Premier League title winners ever”. The notion that Arsenal do not have a clear enough ‘Premier League Player of the Season’ winner has been used as a stick to bash the Gunners with,” Sky Sports’ Sam Blitz wrote.
“It follows criticism throughout the season about their style - the comments made by Fabian Hurzeler about Arsenal’s time-wasting in March appearing to be the height of those complaints. Arteta sarcastically responded: “What a surprise” - a sign he was getting fed up of the criticism of his team.
“Even in the days since their title win was confirmed, there have been plenty of comments on social media about how ‘VARsenal’ won the title due to fortunate refereeing decisions.
“It included Liverpool head coach Arne Slot having a thinly-veiled dig at Arteta’s Arsenal this week. “Congratulations to them,” he said. “But for me they have been a different champion to the last 10 seasons. It is the first time in 30 years that 40 per cent of goals had come from set pieces.”
Despite how it looks on the pitch, how it came to be off it was a stroke of genius.
Mocked for three straight runner-up finishes before this breakthrough title triumph, Arsenal carefully plotted that now would be the time to strike.
“Years before Arsenal would become champions again, the club’s decision-makers identified what they believed could be a rare opportunity in the Premier League’s competitive cycle,” The Athletic’s James McNicholas wrote.
“After a rigorous analysis of rival squads, contract lengths, age profiles and managerial timelines, they projected a “win window” between 2023 and 2027 — a period in which Manchester City and Liverpool, winners of the past eight titles between them, might finally loosen the grip on the division.
“Everything Arsenal subsequently did was built around that calculation.”
They promoted players from their academy like Bukayo Saka, Ethan Nwaneri and Myles Lewis-Skelly as well as targeting other youngsters like Gabriel Martinelli and Emile Smith Rowe.
The Gunners then complimented their young crop with targeted acquisitions of the likes of Jurrien Timber, David Raya and club-record signing Declan Rice.
They also stressed the need for managerial stability in the form of Arteta when others may experience change.
“Arsenal anticipated potential managerial changes at rival clubs, foreseeing the departure of Jurgen Klopp from Liverpool, among others,” McNicholas added.
“They projected the age curves for players such as Mohamed Salah and Virgil van Dijk at Liverpool and Manchester City’s Kevin De Bruyne. It wasn’t a perfectly accurate prediction, but it provided the hierarchy with a framework. Player recruitment was then aligned to these forecasts, enabling Arsenal to assemble a squad designed to peak just as their rivals started to fade.
“Naturally, tweaks and adjustments have been required. There were near misses. Those three consecutive second-place finishes between 2023 and 2025 suggested they were close, but needed more. With Arsenal’s projected opportunity narrowing, the appointment of Andrea Berta as sporting director last March brought about a more aggressive final push in the transfer market.
“Ultimately, Arsenal delivered on the plan they had set in motion years earlier. This title was not simply won on the pitch. It was engineered.”
Those calculations also were not about this title being a one-off either.
“You hope this could be the start of something for Arsenal,” former Gunners striker Ian Wright told Sky Sports.
“Pep [Guardiola is going and Chelsea have to do what they need to do. What’s happening with Liverpool? We’re not sure.
“This is a time when you look at Arsenal’s team, the average age is 24 to 28 and players will want to come to Arsenal now.
“It’s now up to Arteta and Berta who they want to bring in to continue this.
“There is a window for Arsenal before everyone else catches up.
“So, I’m hoping we can take advantage of that.”
Fellow Sky Sports pundit Jamie Redknapp shared the same view on the final day of the season at Selhurst Park.
“The dangerous thing for everyone else in the Premier League now right now is Arsenal could be strong for the next few years,” the former Liverpool and Tottenham midfielder said.
“They have good young players coming through. they have Max Dowman coming through in the next few years.
“They are going to go again.
“London is a great proposition for players. Arsenal are the Premier league title winners.
“Anyone that wants to be serious about their football will be looking at joining Arsenal.”
MAN UTD: GIANT FINALLY AWOKEN?
Arsenal’s ascension to becoming champions and the re-emergence of Manchester United means one of the Premier League’s fiercest rivals may reach its heights of the early 2000s once again.
United have appointed Michael Carrick on a permanent basis after the former skipper lifted them from seventh when Ruben Amorim was sacked to third.
Carrick’s ability to deliver Champions League football in a season where the Red Devils were absent from Europe has not been understated.
But after years of chaos, essentially ever since Sir Alex Ferguson retired, Carrick brought calm back to Old Trafford.
That achievement is perhaps his finest from his interim spell which began in January with wins against Arsenal and Manchester City.
“What Michael Carrick has brought to Manchester United, beyond 12 wins in 17 games plus restoration to the Champions League, is a priceless sense of peace,” The Telegraph’s Oliver Brown wrote.
“Under the care of this “Geordie Ancelotti”, Old Trafford has ceased, for perhaps the first time since Sir Alex Ferguson’s retirement, to be a seething hotbed of palace intrigue.
“There has been no 3-0 humiliation at home by mid-table opposition, no banishment of a senior player from the training-ground canteen, no talk of inheriting the worst team in the history of the club.
“Instead, there has simply been a quiet rebalancing, a dismantling of a culture of rancour and entitlement in favour of such calm professionalism that United have glided to third in the league with a minimum of fuss.”
Carrick now has the opportunity to mount a title challenge next season.
Bruno Fernandes was awarded the Premier League’s player of the season as he broke the assists record with 21 - even if he was described by former Manchester United skipper Roy Keane as being in the middle of a “circus act” with his focus on individual awards.
The Portuguese midfielder fired back by saying in an interview: “What I don’t like is that people make their own words on what I say and it’s not true.”
Regardless, with Fernandes pulling the strings and the development of young players like Kobbie Mainoo, who stagnated under Amorim, it is exciting times at Old Trafford.
They also have a transfer window ahead to build a deeper squad to handle the added demands of Champions League nights.
Fernandes is under new illusions that Carrick is the perfect person to be at the helm.
“It’s a very important step for our club. We need stability in terms of managing,” he told Sky Sports.
“And since Michael came to the club, I’ve known how he works; I worked with him already, but you know how calm he is. He gives calmness to the team.
“But also the moments he needs to put some pressure on us. He does it too.
“He knows the club. He knows what it means and what it demands to be at this club.
“We are very excited for what’s coming, as we always are but as you said, we finished strong and that’s a good sign for what’s coming.”
RISE OF BOURNEMOUTH AND SUNDERLAND
The struggles of some big six clubs in recent seasons have paved the way for others to jump into the upper echelons of the table.
This season it was Aston Villa with a fourth-placed finish to go with their Europa League triumph, as well as Bournemouth and Sunderland that grabbed the opportunity with both hands.
Bournemouth had the potential to make the Champions League if results worked in their favour and Villa finished fifth, handing a spot to the sixth placed finisher.
Regardless, the Cherries will step into the Europa League against the likes of Italian giants AC Milan and Juventus off the back of a club record 18-game unbeaten run.
Much-loved manager Andoni Iraola is departing the club with his next move unconfirmed, but the Spaniard gave Bournemouth a great parting gift.
“I feel so happy because I could not ask for much more,” Iraola said.
“I didn’t want to lose today, I wanted to finish sixth. Also I wanted to finish the season without losing so we can do the second half of the season unbeaten. This is the most difficult achievement we’ve got.
“I enjoyed every second with the fans, with the players. It’s nice to finish like this, something to celebrate. Honestly happy and in the changing room we were celebrating like we should.
“I knew it would be almost impossible to get Europe but the owner told me we want to stay in the Premier League, but I wanted Europe.
“For me to finish this season giving back to the owner, players, supporters, this European qualification is just one way of thanking everyone.”
Sunderland, meanwhile, were this season’s fairytale story.
It has been a serious achievement for promoted teams to remain in the Premier League in recent seasons let alone secured a Europa League place.
Sunderland started the final day of the season in 10th but with a 2-1 win against Chelsea and other results going their way, the Black Cats are off to Europe for the first time since 1973 via finishing seventh.
They were in League One as recently as 2021/22.
“This 24th of May, it’s a perfect day,” Sunderland boss Le Bris told Sky Sports after their win against Chelsea.
“When you think about last season and now we are in the Europa League. It’s crazy, but it shows the consistency of the club.
“Togetherness, the alignment as well. When you work hard as a team, you can do something exceptional.
“We have to reset quickly and prepare for the next season with new challenges. The first will be the Premier League with the same mentality.
“Will there be a big party tonight? Probably, yes.”
Sunderland skipper Granit Xhaka led the charge in midfield all season.
The Swiss veteran was arguably the signing of the season and he revved up the crowd at the Stadium of Light by telling them: “This is just the beginning and we want more.”
On the other side of the coin, it was one final disastrous day for Chelsea.
The Blues had been in the Champions League places for much of the season before falling to tenth, picking up seven points in their last ten matches.
It means the Club World Cup winners will have no European football next season under incoming boss Xabi Alonso.
“It’s a disappointing end to the season,” interim boss Calum McFarlane said.
“We should be finishing a lot higher up the league. For me, with this group of players we should be in the Champions League. We’ve been too inconsistent this year and it’s ultimately cost us.
“The feeling in the dressing room is disappointment. We wanted to win today and make the best of a bad situation and get into the Europa League.
“We weren’t able to do that. We didn’t get the performance we wanted or the result.
“The message to the fans: we’re as disappointed as them and we’re gutted we couldn’t do it for them.
“They’ve been brilliant this year and have really supported us. Especially in the last couple of weeks when we’ve needed to win games and unfortunately we’ve let them down today. We weren’t able to put the performance in they deserve.”