This page is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

There should be a section on criticism of the EPL. It has become money obsessed, players are now getting paid vast sums of money. ((football players are getting paid millions of pounds all around the world, not jst in the Premiership. If people have a problem, then they shouldn't go. See how long clubs can survive without fans but a massive wage bill... 81.106.141.15 05:50, 4 February 2007 (UTC))) The atmosphere in most all seater grounds is terrible with many working class fans being priced out of the game. ((Working Class, what is working class these days anyway? The atmosphere is terrible? I take it you've never been to a Man Utd. vs Chelsea or Arsenal match at Old Trafford, or a Merseyside Derby? 81.106.141.15 05:50, 4 February 2007 (UTC))) The various kick off times are ridiculous and it has done little to improve the performance of the England team. ((The various KO times? The various KO times; eg, the early 12.45 KO's were not designed to help the England team (?!?!) infact, they are designed to give thugs and hooligans a little less time to drink a skinful and start a fight. KO times are controlled by TV, allowing the football to be broadcast to a larger audience 81.106.141.15 05:50, 4 February 2007 (UTC))) Top players still go abroad and top foreign players still prefere Spain and Italy. ((The last 'top' player to leave the UK? RvN now cannot get into the Netherlands Squad, Beckham? Pah. Ballack had offers from Spain, look where he ended up 81.106.141.15 05:50, 4 February 2007 (UTC)))

Michael Ballack's transfer was on a Bosman free, not or £49m as stated in this article. 81.106.141.15 05:50, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

Can somebody add the time of year the premiership matches are played to the competition section? For an outsider, it seems like it would be useful information, but is currently not included. Thanks.

I can't see how the winner is decided anywhere in the article. 'League' competitions in some countries have a finals series at the end to determine the champion, so this was a source of confusion for me. Does anyone agree? ((I think it might be helpful to include what would happen on a tie at the top, I seem to recall a few years ago the possibility of a tie with points, GD, goals for, and head to head results the same, in which the Premiership would be decided by a one off game. I cant find any evidence for it though 81.106.141.15 05:50, 4 February 2007 (UTC)))

Great point. I think the edit I just made should now cover both of the above issues. - Pal 02:49, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the edit -- Ben Di Luca 10:00, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Would it not be best to put this table with the most recent at the top? Frankie Roberto, 12:24, 14 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Team Colours need to be corrected for some clubs, I have corrected up to Fulham. I find it's best to use the shop on the official sites for the colours. Mpbx3003, 10:44 06 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Most Clean Sheets In A Season - Chelsea

Is this definitely correct? According to question three of The Guardian's Tackle Hansen, this record is held by Manchester United. Can anyone confirm/deny this? -- LAW 09:57, 9 August 2005 (UTC)

This is definitely correct. Chelsea had 25 last season, Man U's previous record was 24, set in 1994-95 (see http://msn.foxsports.com/other/story/3398616). -- Howcheng 17:45, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

Top Scorers 1997-98 Andrew Cole also scored 18 league goals that season

This article is littered with non-NPOV and unresearched claims. For instance:

• 'the FA Premier League is said to be the most popular league of any sport in the world' -- said by who? On what grounds?

"And lots of people are watching. The Premier League is the world's highest earning soccer league. Deloitte's Sports Business Group reported average revenue per club was 66.3 million pounds ($144.3 million Cdn) in 2003 2004 -- 50 per cent above the nearest competitor, Italy's Serie A." ( Sportsnet.ca article) -- Munkeyjunkey 19:58, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

• '[Chelsea] fans are now known for their astonishing amnesia as to the utter mediocrity from whence they came' -- amusing but totally non-NPOV.

Someone with a better knowledge of football than me needs to fix this -- I've listed the page as non-neutral and needing cleanup. -- Ngb 08:51, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

I've sourced the "most popular" reference and moved the "Worldwide reach" section up into "Overview" to make it more clear. I've also rewritten the sentence to be more NPOV (and moved that whole section to another article, while I was at it). As a result, I'm taking out the NPOV tag. I'll leave the cleanup one in, though, for the time being. -- Howcheng 17:45, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

• 'However a combination of Sky’s marketing strategy, the quality of the FA Premier League football and the public’s appetite for the game has seen the value of the FA Premier League’s broadcast rights soar and delivered huge benefits to the game.'

Not as non-NPOV as the above, but unless you're a fan of the big three (or a player!) it's IMHO highly arguable. Dave.Dunford 06:17, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Fair point, I removed the last part of that quote. - Pal 13:10, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

It seems to me that perhaps the "Curse of Christmas" and "The Premiership-Football League gulf" sections should probably be moved to their own articles. Any objections? -- Howcheng 17:45, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

Since there were no objections, I moved the "Premiership-Football League gulf" to a new article, but left "Curse of Christmas". -- Howcheng 17:22, 12 August 2005 (UTC)

The lion logo has changed slightly this season - still triangular but far less horizontally symmetrical.

"Always contained a team who's name began with W" - so what? There's always been one with A as well, Arsenal. I'm sure there are other letters too (E - Everton, L - Liverpool, M - Manchester, N - Newcastle. Bob Palin 15:05, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

agreed 81.106.152.105 18:11, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

I have changed the Spurs badge on the list of teams to the new 'official' badge - this will be used from now on and will feature on the Spurs kit from next season - so thought i'd bring the list up to date.-- Cavs 16:59, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Silly question perhaps, but what's the schedule of the league? -- Robert Merkel

Whats the name of the song they play of tv for EPL? Its kinda techno/dance - no words. If you know, could you please tell me! I have been humming it for about a fortnight!!!-- Hamedog ^{Talk| @} 14:32, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

Catchy, isn't it? I'd love to know more about it too. Xiner 17:52, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

It's called the Premier League Anthem. There's some info here - http://eplleague.blogspot.com/2007/01/story-behind-english-premier-league.html We should update the article to include. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Chancemichaels ( talk • contribs) 22:14, 23 February 2007 (UTC).

Here's the data for all the league results in the Premiership, I dont know how to put it in table format so if someone wants to then they could do that. It would be handy for settling office disputes etc...

Pos	Team	                Plyd	 W	 D	 L	 F	 A	GD	Points
1	Manchester United	506	314	118	74	985	455	530	1060
2	Arsenal	                506	269	139	98	843	452	391	946
3	Liverpool	        506	240	129	137	811	527	284	849
4	Chelsea	                506	232	143	131	776	504	272	839
5	Newcastle United	464	201	125	138	727	549	178	728
6	Aston Villa	        506	193	146	167	626	577	49	725
7	Leeds United	        468	189	125	154	641	573	68	692
8	Tottenham Hotspur	506	177	132	197	661	694	-33	663
9	Blackburn Rovers	430	171	119	140	599	511	88	632
10	Everton	                506	163	138	205	617	690	-73	627
11	Southampton	        506	150	137	219	596	711	-115	587
12	West Ham United	        388	132	104	152	462	535	-73	500
13	Middlesbrough	        384	119	114	151	458	524	-66	471
14	Coventry City	        354	99	112	143	387	490	-103	409
15	Sheffield Wednesday	316	101	89	126	409	453	-44	392
16	Wimbledon	        316	99	94	123	384	472	-88	391
17	Manchester City	        316	90	97	129	370	434	-64	367
18	Leicester City	        308	84	90	134	314	410	-96	342
19	Charlton Athletic	228	72	64	92	267	327	-60	280
20	Bolton Wanderers	228	66	66	96	262	340	-78	264
21	Derby County	        228	67	62	99	251	331	-80	263
22	Nottingham Forest	198	60	59	79	229	287	-58	239
23	Ipswich Town	        202	57	53	92	219	312	-93	224
24	Queens Park Rangers	164	59	39	66	224	232	-8	216
25	Sunderland	        190	55	49	86	188	266	-78	214
26	Norwich City	        164	50	51	63	207	257	-50	201
27	Fulham	                152	49	41	62	181	200	-19	188
28	Crystal Palace	        160	37	49	74	160	243	-83	160
29	Birmingham	        114	36	35	43	124	143	-19	143
30	Sheffield United	84	22	28	34	96	113	-17	94
31	Oldham Athletic	        84	22	23	39	105	142	-37	89
32	Portsmouth	        76	22	18	36	90	113	-23	84
33	Bradford City	        76	14	20	42	68	138	-70	62
34	West Bromwich Albion	76	12	24	40	65	126	-61	60
35	Barnsley	        38	10	5	23	37	82	-45	35
36	Wolverhampton Wanderers	38	7	12	19	38	77	-39	33
37	Swindon Town	        42	5	15	22	47	100	-53	30
38	Watford	                38	6	6	26	35	77	-42	24

I've put the data into a table format. But you should probably add at what date it was correct. -- Hopex 16:36, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

Are you sure the table is accurate and complete? The GD sums up to 92. So either some teams are missing or there is something else strange going on. At the very least, a footnote would be nessary IMHO to explain this Nil Einne 11:35, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

I formatted the table in more wiki style:

I used de:Wikipedia:Helferlein/VBA-Macro for EXCEL tableconversion and some minor manual edits with the help of Meta:Help:Table Nil Einne 12:33, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

The table is all good, but does not take into account the fact that some teams have played more games than others. Perhaps someone could compute a win percentage or a points per game ratio (as well as mean number of points per season) and add a column to the table including that. It is obvious that ManU and Arsenal will still head the list, since the teams that have played less games and accumulated fewer points have not played every season. But for mid-table teams like Villa, Boro, Spurs and Everton, it might provide a more accurate comparison of performance in the league, e.g. just because Everton have played every season, does not mean they are more consistent than Boro or Blackburn, because the last two did not play every season but has been highly successful at times. Also, it is obvious that the table needs updating; it was only correct as of the end of the 05-06 season.

Pardon me for the comment, but it seems that Wikipedia's Featured Articles still have a long way to go. Avman M 14:19, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

Is there any reason no one has every put up a current league table that would be updated as results occurred? I thouht about doing it, but I wondered if there was a reason no one else had.

Because the current league table is in the FA Premier League 2005-06 article. I think there was opposition to putting it in this article before. Mark272 09:06, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

This table is clearly incorrect. It gives Man U a season more (and correspondingly higher number of games played) than all of the other teams that have been in the Premiership since its inception. This includes Arsenal and Liverpool (both of whom in fairness would still be behind Man U in the table). —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 81.104.228.185 ( talk • contribs) .

Thank you for pointing this out. I have traced the edit back to when the table was correct and re-entered that version. I hope to update the table up to the present date within the next 24 hours. Alias Flood 23:36, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

I had informed User:Mark272 on his talk page that I was in the process of updating the table but he has updated it in part once more. I have reverted. I hope to put the new table up to include 2005/6 within the hour. The table will show the number of championships won although it will be by points total. Before any amendments are made to the table by other editors, it would be useful if we could have discussion here please. I will add a comment to my edit requesting this. Thank you. Alias Flood 20:42, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

I have now updated the table in full to include 2005-2006. Alias Flood 21:33, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

I think the Fulham total points (and position in table) is wrong - fchd 05:18, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Thank you. I have corrected the table accordingly (from 166 points to 236) -- Alias Flood 17:13, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Just wanted to point out that the reason for Fulham's points being inconsistent is because they were updated by anonymous one day, and not reverted - presumably after Fulham had won or something. Mark272 19:03, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Is there an RSS feed showing the premiership tbale i.e. 20 items per week in premiership table order? If so, could this be added as an external link so readers can get the latest table?

We seem to have an orphaned asterisk {*) against Total wins* in the table's heading. Can anyone shed any light on this please? See FA_Premier_League#FA_Premier_League_Winners_to_date. Alias Flood 17:41, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

This has now been corrected by another editor. See [1]. Problem solved. Alias Flood 18:33, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

The list of managers is fairly irrelevant IMO, would anyone object if it was removed? Oldelpaso 13:47, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

I wouldn't. You can easily get the info from the individual team pages anyway. - Pal 13:55, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

OK, I've removed it. On a similar note, perhaps the lists of current and former Premier League clubs should be moved to List of FA Premier League clubs or somesuch. Oldelpaso 19:45, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

I would say yes to moving (or maybe even eliminating) the former clubs list given the other page you mentioned. However, I'd say keep the currents clubs list. I know lists aren't ideal in FACs, but IMO this info is crucial to the article and should be included. - Pal 03:47, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

The Major League Soccer page has a box that displays the year the league was founded, the number of teams, and the last cup winner. Should this page have similiar infobox? I rather like the info box, but maybe the information provided there would need to be changed to fit with the Premiership. Thoughts? Rballou 17:16, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

I simply removed the info box (which contained no info) part of it for now, leaving just the logo. This seems to be the standard for most leagues around here. I think you want either a clean look with like this, or useful info there. -- Cthomer5000 03:28, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

I removed the last two paragraphs from the worldwide section as I searched and couldn't find any sources for the info. The only references to "football ferries" seem to come from replications of this article, and the comment about Irish supporters preferring the EPL certainly seems POV without a source.

The part about the Old Firm clubs would also need sources. I found an article about the Old Firm clubs making overtures to join the EPL in 2001, but FIFA and UEFA rejected this. I'm not sure how it's relevant to the article right now, unless someone can locate a more recent source. - Pal 13:41, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

One of the FAC objections rightly points out that newspaper coverage of the Premier League is not mentioned in the Media coverage section. I sat down to add a couple of paragraphs, but I'm having trouble avoiding weasel words and finding references. Football dominates newspaper sports coverage in England, and Premier League matches, teams and players get the majority of it. That is evident to anyone who picks up an English newspaper. But finding a source which says this is difficult, as most relevant search terms take you straight to sports coverage itself. Anyone have any ideas? Oldelpaso 19:22, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Not that this helps Oldelpaso, but on a somewhat related note I'm having difficulty finding anything worthwhile to complement the "Worldwide" section. This probably has something to do with a lot of the foreign press coverage being written in languages that wouldn't pop up on a search done in English. I'd be open to suggestions as well. - Pal 21:21, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

I'll see what I can find tomorrow. Oldelpaso 21:39, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

In comments on this article's FAC page, some have suggested moving the "All-Time Table" into its own article and simply linking to it. I'm leaning towards this as it might not be of great importance to the main article, but I wanted to see if anyone had any objections first. - Pal 21:23, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

No objections from me. Oldelpaso 21:39, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

The sentence This represents an increase of over 60 per cent from the average attendance of 21,126 recorded in the league's first season (1992-93). is possibly misleading; in 1992-93 a large number of grounds had restricted capacities, as they were being redeveloped to comply with the requirements set out in the Taylor Report. Oldelpaso 19:42, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

I added a sentence that mentions this fact, though it doesn't specifically cite which stadiums were under construction. I'm not sure that could be done without linking to the history of every PL stadium from 92-93, which could be rather tedious. - Pal 01:57, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

What about creating a List of foreign FA Premier League players like the List of foreign MLS players? In England foreign players are gaining more attention day-by-day, so it would be useful to group'em in a list. Too hard? P.S.: unfortunately I haven't enough infos to create it, but I would collaborate. -- necronudist 16:38, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

I think something should be said about the catholic/protestant in the foundations of the league. Like Celtic and Rangers, English clubs have allegiances to christian denominations, which have been all but forgotten. Many clubs in the league have take a side each, indeed, it was the reason for their founding. For example, Liverpool/Everton, Manchester United/Manchester City are teams who bear this mark. Perhaps someone could clarify the same with other teams such as Birmingham/Aston Villa, Sheffield United/Wednesday and some of the london teams. Tottenham, of course, has jewish roots. I think this is a fascinating and fundemental aspect of British football that should be mentioned in detail. Bobbyfletch85 00:07, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

I dare say in certain parts of Glasgow or Belfast more or less every club has a percieved religous affiliation, but in most cases the evidence for this is highly questionable to say the least, and has no relevance to the FA Premier League as a competition anyway. Oldelpaso 10:42, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

I fail to see the importance of any historical religous affiliations to the vast majority of English clubs. Religion may have been more central to the general game of football in the distant past (i.e. over a century ago) but in the past few decades none of the English clubs you mention display any major "allegiances to christian denominations". To say it is a "fundemental aspect of British football" is a massive exageration unless one looks back a long, long time; about a century before the formation of the Premier League (which remeber is what this article is about). Canderra 00:08, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Indeed, that sort of information seems more appropriate to the clubs' respective articles. howch e ng { chat} 00:15, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

I reverted an addition about the "official supplier of numbers, letters and sleeve badges". I generally try not to use the term "cruft", but in this case I can't think of another way to describe it. Oldelpaso 18:57, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

Why did FIFA pressure the FA to limit its size? This is not explained as far as I can see. Anchoress 02:04, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the fix, it's much clearer. Anchoress 06:08, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

"It is presently contested by 20 clubs, dominated by Arsenal, Manchester United and current champions Chelsea." Little bit harsh to exclude Liverpool. They have never actually won it, but they have come second twice, and are 3rd in the All-time FA Premier League table. They were the Bookies' second favourites this year, ahead of Arsenal and Man Utd. Legis 10:20, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

And Chelsea have only dominated in the last couple of years. I'll dig through the history to find a better sentence. Oldelpaso 17:00, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

The article lack HDTV broadcasting information.

This article claims that there are 'a total of 760 games in a Premier League season.' I may be wrong, but I'm fairly sure it's 380; 20 teams x 19 home games (you don't need to count away matches because they will still be someone's home matches) gives 380. Can anyone else confirm this? Happyjoe5 16:29, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

Makes sense to me so I changed it! Bit of a sloppy error for a featured article. Well spotted Happyjoe :) -- Hopex 16:44, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

380 is correct. The edit introducing the error occurred at some point today, during the article's time on the main page. Oldelpaso 16:58, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

It keeps getting changed to 760. I'm sure I've reverted it back to 380 on at least a couple of occasions. - fchd 06:38, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. Happyjoe5 19:14, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

It is 380 - remember that two teams play in each game! Bob Palin 13:19, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

Not to be nitpicky, but this picture is actually of an FA Cup match, not a Premier League match. See [2] for pictures from WireImages. howch e ng { chat} 16:53, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

As a new fan of the EPL, I was wondering which is considered a more prestigious honor for a team: to win the Premier League or to win the FA Cup? Nygoodliving 15:48, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

Winning the league. This has not always been the case, at one time the league title and FA Cup were viewed more or less equal, and in the early days of professional football the FA Cup was viewed as the most prestigous, as it is the older competition. Part of the allure of the cup came from the fact that until the 1980s the FA Cup final was the only club match which was televised live on English TV. Since live televised games have become more commonplace, the profile of the cup has diminished relative to the league. However, the cup is still valued very highly, more so than in other European countries where the national cup is very much a secondary competition. (Note: This answer refers to the league title in general rather than the Premier League specifically, as the Premier League only formed in 1992) Oldelpaso 18:36, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your help. I mentioned the EPL but was referring to the league title in general. As the FA Cup is a knock-out competition, I would have thought it would always have been more prestigious than the league title. Same for most other European leagues. I would have thought winning their cup competitions would be more highly regarded than winning the league. Oh well, live and learn. But I guess that's the american mentality in me, where a league title would be equivalent to a baseball regular season and the cup would be the playoffs and World Series.

So I understand it then, to English teams right now, the rank of trophies is the European Cup at the pinnacle, followed by the league and FA Cup. Correct? Also, where would the League Cup (Carling Cup) fall into that order, last? Nygoodliving 17:48, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

The League Cup is certainly lower than the FA Cup by anyone's standards. Also, if you are including European Cup ( Champions League) in there, you should include the Club World Cup too, though I'm not exactly sure whether or not that is considered more important than the Champions League by the general public, as some people may not even be aware there is a Club World Cup. Perhaps you should also include the UEFA Cup. - MTC 21:18, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

By my reckoning, the order of prestige would be: Champions' League > Premiership > FA Cup > UEFA Cup > League Cup > Club World Cup. The FA and UEFA may be interchangeable, but that's how I see it. -- Boothman _/tɔːk/ 22:11, 2 December 2006 (UTC).

Oh if the big 4 [now that Arse is last big 3] would care about the FA Cup, then it would be biggest. Chivista 23:30, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

A lot of people would consider the Premier League (or La Liga, Serie A) to be a bigger achievement than winning the Champions League. The domestic league is over 38 games so it arguably is a better judge of quality than a knockout tournament. 99% of the Manchester United fans I spoke to before this season began placed the domestic title as more of a priority.

That said, for clubs like Chelsea and Arsenal who have never won it, it might be a bigger achievement. Illuminattile 12:18, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

some of the appeal of the fa cup was lost when man utd didnt enter because they were playing in the world club cup but the appeal of the cup has been restored now i think.-- Numberwang 14:22, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Does anyone know the payroll level for the clubs in the EPL? I know that 4 clubs pay quite a bit higher than the rest, but it would be helpful to see just how large the differences are. Kenallen 22:11, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

The Deloitte Football Money League, which is based upon turnover, gives some information in this regard. Oldelpaso 22:25, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

Looking at stuff like Football Manager, which is pretty accurate, I'd hazard a guess that the average wage be £15k-25k a week. Obviously this depends on what club, for example Sheffield Utd will pay a lot less than Everton or Tottenham Hotspur, although neither of them are part of the big 4. Man United, Chelsea etc will often average around £30k-50k a week, although some players like Michael Ballack will be on over £100k a week. -- Boothman _/tɔːk/ 12:55, 28 December 2006 (UTC).

I just put on a map I just whipped up to show the locations of the teams. It definitely could be better, something like this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:FA_Clubs_map_home_colours.PNG. Or at least it could be better quality (this is my first map). I felt that since many other leagues have maps showing the locations of their teams it would be a good addition. Senor k 12:05, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Good idea maybe you could make one for the coming season Chaza93 20:34, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

I have added a spoken version of this article; see the link at the top. Hassocks5489 17:59, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

the Premier League or Premiership or Barclays Premier League or simply the Premiership. should never be refered to as the EPL -- Numberwang 22:42, 28 April 2007 (UTC)

"The EPL" is the common nickname for the league in the United States. While it may not be an official name of the league, it is nevertheless accurate (in that the Premier League is in England, and therefore English), widespread, and understood by all Americans that follow soccer (and many that don't). 67.101.97.171 23:35, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

Fulham's stadium can actually hold 24,554 rather then 22,000. This also makes it higher then Reading's Madjeski stadium. In 2007/08 the capacity will be increased to about 26,000. 90.194.239.197 14:25, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

If you wish to add this please cite the inforation Chaza93 20:32, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

The Premiership boasts some of the best players in the world, including many from outside England.

Is it really necessary to include "incl. many from outside england"? That seems a little redundant to me, surely it is obvious that the best players in the world aren't all from england. Tommy Stardust 15:02, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

Very much so. Its particularly redundant when the sentence is in the start of the Finance section rather than the Players section. Thus I've removed the sentence entirely. Oldelpaso 15:53, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

Not sure why the cups Premiership teams compete in shouldn't be included in the infobox. Using the logic that "they have nothing to do with the Premier League," then the UEFA links should be removed as they have nothing to do with the league. As the cups are listed on every league page of every country on which this particular infobox appears, I'm not sure why they shouldn't also appear here. - Pal 23:36, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Because for all English leagues, the infoboxes relate to the league cups within that competition. Under your logic, the FA Cup would appear under all the leagues under which clubs from that league compete in the Cup. Having the FA Cup and League Cup in that box make it look like they are controlled by the Premier League. The European Cups are different - they are "Qualification to" in the same way that the Football League Championship is "Relegation to" and all other leagues have "Promotion to" - fchd 05:09, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

They currently do appear in all the infoboxes of the other leagues from which teams compete in the said cups, but that's really not the main point. I actually kind of agree with you that it could be confusing the way it is now, but I think it's more confusing when it says "None." Perhaps remove the cups section entirely from the infobox? Or change it to "Domestic Cup Participation" or something of the like? - Pal 02:06, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

The F.A. Cup doesn't appear in the infoboxes for the Football League, Football Conference, Southern League (football), Northern Premier League, Isthmian League etc., each of whose clubs compete in the Cup. The Football League Cup does, of course, appear in the Football League infobox as that cup is organised by that league. - fchd 05:23, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

I was referring to the Football League Championship, League One, League Two, Conference National, etc. pages. The cups appear on all of those (not to mention the cups are listed on the La Liga and Serie A pages, among others). The Premier League is different in that the entity and the league itself are intertwined in the same article, which is not the case with the other entities you mentioned. Perhaps one of the alternatives I mentioned? - Pal 11:51, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

The Wikipedia page on UEFA League coefficients for 2007-08 puts the Premier League in third place behind Spain and Italy. Why does the first paragraph of the article therefore say "The Premier League is currently second behind Spain's La Liga in the UEFA rankings of European leagues, which are based on the performances of member clubs in European competitions over a five-year period." If there is an updated (2007) edition of the UEFA coefficients, why hasn't the update been made on the UEFA coefficients page. If Englad is still # 3, the above information is wrong. Avman M 00:28, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

According to this source, which is one of the sources mentioned at the UEFA coefficients page, the premier league is ranked second. The UEFA coefficients page gives the 2006 rankings (which determines the 2007/08 season allocation of places), and not the 2007 rankings. Although I don't think UEFA has officially published the 2007 rankings yet, all the various sources (see the UEFA coefficients article) agree that England are placed second. Krea 01:29, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

IMO these need work. It leaps straight from the 10 "super league" clubs threatening to break away to an already-established 22-team league. Plus, for the uninitiated, they might not understand how big the Football League was before, how the money was split, how promotion/relegation previously worked, how it changed, what the names of the old divisions were, etc.

It says that more detail is provided in the History of English Football article but it's glossed over here, too.

I'd like to see the aforementioned sections drastically fleshed out because they are sorely lacking at present. Nach0king 22:03, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

I should add that the rest of the article is excellent and that I don't mean these criticisms badly. Nach0king 22:05, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

This line, falls totally into the above and should be removed...

Based on the performances of member clubs in European competitions over a five-year period, with the 2006/07 season results in consideration, the Premier League is unofficially ranked second ^[1] behind Spain's La Liga, but ahead of Italy's Serie A in the UEFA rankings of European leagues; this is an improvement on the third place from the official rankings up to the 2005-06 season. ^[2]

Why just the last 5 years (recentism) and why use a totally unofficial claim to back it up? If taken into account the most presitgious honour a European club can achieve, the European Cup, the English league is historically a long way off the mark according to European Cup and Champions League records and statistics.

• Italian clubs have won 11 finals, and taken part in 25 all-together.
• Spanish clubs have won 11 finals, and taken part in 20 all-together.
• English clubs have won 10 finals, and taken part in 14 all-together.

This is the information that should be used so not to fall into recentism, unofficial and POV. It uses the simple facts of the most prestigious tournament in European football. - The Daddy 07:28, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

The last five years are used by UEFA to calculate coefficients in any given year - see the link provided (the five coefficients starting in 02/03 are added together to rank the clubs in 07, for example.) Bert Kassell's site is unofficial but widely recognised as the most up-to-date source in the field, but I can see why it looks strange to compare it to the official rankings.

As for your last point, the Premier League didn't exist when the vast bulk of those finals took place, and top-level football is almost unrecognisably different now as opposed to then.

In the context of both the historical development of football, and UEFA's ranking system, the five-year total makes perfect sense. But whether it should be included where it is, and whether it's recentism, is very much open to debate, and I'm inclined to agree with you on that score. Nach0king 15:54, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

The citation is not "totally unofficial", it's statistics from UEFA that are going to be used for UEFA coefficients, unless something extraordinary happens (such as Calciopoli). It's not "recentist" to give England's current position in the standings, and as this position is calculated based on the previous five years, this is explained. I agree that the statement needs to be given context: the coefficient is about performance in Europe, not of the quality of the league itself. Whilst the text attempts to clarify this, it doesn't do so well enough at the moment.

As far as POV goes, English teams are one win behind Spanish and Italian teams, with six and eleven fewer attempts at doing so respectively. So they're not "historically a long way off", they've merely lost fewer games. Not to mention that they didn't enter early tournaments (which, incidentally, were dominated by Spanish clubs) and were banned in the late 80s/ early 90s, immediately after a period of dominance. BeL1EveR 22:07, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

When does UEFA actually release official league coefficients? The 06-07 leagues are over in all countries. However assuming that UEFA would wait until November to include a few countries like Sweden or Iceland where the season only starts in March and takes place in summer because of the cold weather in winters, it means that any 2007 coefficients being unofficially released cannot be accurat, since they do not take these countries into account. The official coefficients should be used as soon as they are available. Whoever says that the citations are not "totally unofficial" is wrong, since if UEFA does not issue updated versions until late in the year, any versions published now have no official basis. Avman M 14:41, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

But actual domestic league results, whether in the Scandinavian countries or elsewhere, have no bearing on the UEFA coefficients. The position as at the end of the 06-07 season is closed, it just seems they have not published the figures officially yet, but because of Bert's work, everyone knows what they will be. - fchd 14:46, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

Regardless, an unofficial site should hardly form the basis for a Wikipedia article. This issue only cropped up because, until a month or so ago, someone confidently stated in the first paragraph that the Premier League lies second, whereas in the Wikipedia page on UEFA coeffs., England were third as of 2006. Before I brought this matter to light (see heading UEFA League coefficients above), people were happily writing the article using unofficial data, or simply making up their own mind as to the league's position. Once again, regardless of past reliability, the provided figures are from unofficial sources and SHOULD NOT be used as if they are automatically true. Avman M 15:01, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

But all of his information is sourced very well, and on the site it is fully explained how he arrives at these conclusions. He is widely regarded as an expert. It is not simply one guy on a messageboard, for instance, but a sober study of UEFA statistics. I agree that it should be noted that they are unofficial but they are genuinely regarded as reliable. Nach0king 13:41, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

i always noticed that current league tables aren't included in articles, i thought it was because this was deemed to news-y or something and was really relevant to an encyclopaedic article. but either way can we include the table in this article, or exclude similar tables from other articles —Preceding unsigned comment added by 172.143.157.194 ( talk) 19:42, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

"The 2007–08 Season sees the Premier League introduce a new theme song, logo, typeface for player names and numbers, and patches." has anyone got details of this new stuff? Screen42 22:35, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Surely we should call this the English Prmier League seeing as some other countries call their leagues the Premier League. El- Nin 09 20:25, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

No. Both the official name and the common name is the "Premier League". Just like The F.A. is The FA. - fchd 20:32, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

fchd in reply, the French FA is universally known as Federation de Football Francais. El- Nin 09 18:07, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

No, it's called the Fédération Française de Football, but the English article is at French Football Federation. - MTC 20:09, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

I think there should be a picture of the trophy awarded to the champions somewhere in the article. The FA Cup article has a picture of the trophy. I know the Premier League trophy is nowhere near as famous, but then again how many trophies are as famous as the FA Cup? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.126.208.26 ( talk) 00:15, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Anyone watching this article? Vandal alert: 77.107.196.106. Apparantly a Manchester United fan, and Chelsea and Arsenal "Hater" —Preceding unsigned comment added by Xaiver0510 ( talk • contribs) 03:05, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

The concept of transfers is pretty unique in the sports world (in the U.S, sports have free agency and trades. It would be useful to have an explanation of how they work. For instance:

• Is every player available for transfer?
• What is the general player-team relationship? contract? at will employment? guaranteed payments? payments/game? /season? What rights does the team get (doesn't seem to be exclusive playing, with national teams, etc)
• What does the team that pays the transfer fee get? (the right to employ the player? or is it the salary of the player?)
• How is the transfer fee negotiated? For instance, does the paying team work with the player or the other team? Can the other team veto/decline/walk away?
• How does the loan work? (what benefit does the loaning team get, and what cost does the receiving team pay?)

216.145.56.17 21:56, 15 November 2007 (UTC) miles l

The concept of transfers is pretty much universal in the sports world, with North American sports being the exception. I don't think this article is the best place to cover it. Nuttah68 22:13, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

Though I'm always receptive to adding information which will help people to understand a situation better, I have to agree - most of the world uses the system that the English use for transfers. If anyone wanted help to understand this area, I would point them at transfer (football), although that article could do with a bit added if you genuinely want those questions answered. At any rate, it isn't totally practical (in my opinion) to add the laws of transfers to every (high-profile, at least) competition article which uses this system, and I would suggest at the most that a link in this article to that transfer article is what is needed.

If you think that anything is needed to be added to transfer (football), I would place a request on that page's talk page, and if noone else does, then I at least will add what I can from my limited knowledge. Just my opinion, of course. Falastur2 23:05, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

I have removed the stadia list as it is only tangentially related to the Premier League itself, and the material was more or less a duplicate of that at List of English football stadia by capacity. -- Oldelpaso ( talk) 17:15, 16 November 2007 (UTC)

The following line in the Premier League#Foundation section seems to be either WP:POV or WP:OR. I think it needs a reference. This was considered necessary so that English clubs could once again compete with and beat the best of Europe, while attracting the best talent in the world, something which in 1991 seemed practically unthinkable. Peanut4 ( talk) 23:01, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

The name of this article, Premier League, should be English Premier League. As it is, there is an implication of exclusivity, ie that this league is the Premier League and any other sporting competition which has a "premier league" in its competition structure is less worthy of the title.

A parallel example: The word Idol as well as its dictionary meanings is also a short colloquial reference to a certain TV show - but the reference varies according to where you are. An American uses the word to refer to American Idol, a Briton to Pop Idol. The Wiki article Idol is a disambiguation page, not an article about one version of that TV show.

I will monitor this discussion for a short while, after which I will be moving this article to English Premier League (which is currently a redirect) and making Premier League into a disambiguation page. Darcyj ( talk) 03:51, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

(New talk page sections go at the bottom.) - MTC ( talk) 08:04, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Yes, but signal to noise ratio on this discussion page is high and I wanted this to be noticed. Darcyj ( talk) 10:40, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Do you have any evidence that "English Premier League" is an official name of this league? The only official name of this competition is "Premier League", and it seems to be the only league in the world which uses "Premier League" as the official name without a qualifier.

Your parallel example fails for at least two reasons: both articles are at their official names (where they should be), and I can't say I've ever heard anyone use "Idol" to refer to Pop Idol. - MTC ( talk) 08:04, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Shortening the name of the TV show as cited is commonplace in the United States and Australia, and here in Australia the Premier League is shown on a pay television network and referred to as the English Premier League - obviously it's not official because the official name of the league includes the name of the sponsor. Finally, there are a number of national top-flight football leagues which are called "Premier League" in that nation - eg, Scottish Premier League, perhaps the most well known of such leagues. Darcyj ( talk) 10:40, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Disagree with the intended move - "Premier League" is the official (and common) name of the competition. If Australians or any other group need to dismabiguate it in their own contexts, that's not really an issue for Wikipedia. The "Scottish Premier League" goes by that name or even the abbreviation "SPL", there is no grounds for confusion at least here in the UK. - fchd ( talk) 10:54, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

I agree with fchd and I would also state that the correct format for this discussion would be a WP:RM. At the moment there is no need to disambiguate as this is the common and official name of the League. We had this issue with the Royal Navy a while back and the outcome was that the Royal Navy stayed where it was. Woody ( talk) 10:59, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Disagree, as per fchd and Woody. I do agree that this should have gone on WP:RM, though I feel the point is now moot as there seems to be a distinct lack of consensus on the move. — OwenBlacker ( Talk) 19:01, 23 February 2008 (UTC)

Is this 260, or 261? Everywhere else on wiki, including the Alan Shearer article, states 260, which is also the total if you add all the league goals he's scored since '92 (when Premiership started). However, on the Top scorers section of this article, and on the official Premiership website it says 261. Can someone who knows the correct figure clarify/correct this please? Feudonym ( talk) 06:52, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

SoccerBase says 260 ( http://www.soccerbase.com/players_details.sd?playerid=7218). As Feudonym says, the official Premier League site says 261. It also adds up to 261 if you extract from the tables his performance each season: 16, 31, 34, 31, 25, 2, 14, 23, 5, 24, 17, 22, 7, 10, 0.

The discrepancy is in the 2001/2002 season. According to the Alan Shearer article on Wikipedia, Shearer scored 23 goals for Newcastle United in that season, but the FA records 24 goals.

The Newcastle website lists all of Shearer's goals for each of his seasons with them, and they record 24, which I tend to regard as definitive. ( http://www.nufc.premiumtv.co.uk/page/ShearerGoalDetail/0,,10278~757279,00.html)

I suggest that his number of goals should be increased to 261. Nickpullar ( talk) 17:04, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

As far as I can see, the arithmetic is wrong. If you look at the 2001-02 results at [3], Shearer did score 27 goals in total but 4 of those were cup goals; 2 vs. Ipswich & 1 each vs. Palace and Peterborough. Thus, his league goals in 2001-02 were 23, not 24. This ties up with the totals at Soccerbase and www. allfootballers.com. Daemonic Kangaroo ( talk) 20:31, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

The Premier League website is wrong. They had 260 before they redesigned the website last summer. All printed sources I have seen (News of the World and Sky Sports annuals) also list 260. Catchpole ( talk) 22:08, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

To save constant reverting people need to decide which ref they want to believe as, obviously, the Premier league page and the Rothmans/Sky Sports book differ. To carry two refs is nonsense and the figures differ not only for Shearer but also Fowler, Ferdinand and others, making this encyclopedic entry very suspect....-- Egghead06 ( talk) 17:24, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

The only thing suspect here is the Premier League website. Carrying reliable statistics is very low on their list of priorities, rather they are focused on getting extra games in Dubai and Las Vegas. The website had the correct numbers before the redesign last summer, I suspect this discrepancy is a result of sloppy data entry. Catchpole ( talk) 23:15, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink

I've spotted another similar problem. Jimmy Floyd Hasselbainks's goals were changed from 128 to 129 today. According to Hasselbaink's article and soccerbase he scored 129 Premier League goals, but the reference on the Premier League page says 128. I've reverted it back to 128, simply to fit in line with the reference on the main page itself. Peanut4 ( talk) 01:51, 26 February 2008 (UTC)