The Premier League season has finally come to an end, as Manchester City retained their title for a third successive season and Southampton, Leeds and Leicester all suffered relegation.
Everton’s 1-0 win over Bournemouth at Goodison Park on the final day saw them escape the drop to ensure their 68-year stay in the top-flight continued.
Whereas Liverpool finished in fifth place; that was their first time finishing outside of the top four since Jurgen Klopp’s first season eight years ago, as they rounded off the season with a 4-4 draw with Southampton.
With the season now concluded, we’ve decided to look at the table if it was based on expected points.
As explained by the social media account - ‘The xG Philosophy’ - expected points measures the number of points a team could have expected to have taken from a game, based on the scoring opportunities (xG) that they created and conceded in that game.
It’s essentially an in-depth look at the quality of chances created and conceded and can often tell you the real story behind a game’s result and then added up over the course of a season.
For example, Manchester City ended the season as champions on 89 points and that end figure out-performed their expected points total of 83.04 points by (-)5.96 which helps to tell us the true ability of teams. There’s also expected goals scored and expected goals against which also helps to show us how a team has performed - but this table just focuses solely on xP.
Another example to explain it further sees us using a side such as West Ham; the Hammers finished 14th in the league table, but they finished 11th in the xP table as they were expected to earn an additional (+)11.62 points than their end total. Their under-performed on their expected goals by nine, meaning their xP issues have come from a lack of potency in front of goal.
With that in mind, we’ve decided to look at how the Premier League table would look based on expected points per game, with teams each getting a small justification to their xP position, as well as having their real points total shown as well.
1. Manchester City - 83.04 (89)
Guardiola’s side outperformed their xP by 5.96 in what was a brilliant season.
2. Arsenal - 72.53 (84)
Having led the league for so long, Arsenal looked set to win an unlikely title, but they were brilliant all season, as shown by their -11.47 positive points swing.
3. Newcastle - 71.67 (71)
The Magpies earned Champions League football after a great season, but they only slightly under-performed by +0.67 on their xP.
4. Brighton and Hove Albion - 70.86 (62)
A team which has been infamous for under-performing on their xP across recent seasons has struck again - this time by +8.86 points - meaning their sixth-placed finish could have been even better.