General Premier League Thread 2025/2026 - See Post #1 for Mod Note

Based on his hilarious post in the champions league thread. I wouldnt take any heed to what he says, when it comes to Arsenal. Think he should stick to Rugby tbh.

Edit. Not actually watching the game though. City Xg 2.4 to Burnleys 0.5. If it stays at this score though (fingers crossed) its actually not the worst outcome as an Arsenal fan. To be second only on goals scored, with 5 games to go. Still leaves a decent chance there imo.

Why were you crossing fingers for it to stay at that score?

Not celebrating, but imo was probably the best result as an Arsenal fan we could have gotten. As 19th place Burnley were never getting anything out of the game imo.

Its now neck and neck. City only top on goal scored and by your own words at this stage of the season you get close games no matter who you play.

5 games and still all to play for, as in neither teams hands now. City with a very marginal advantage, but on paper have the trickier fixtures. But dont have to play Atletico Madrid twice in between.

Tiebreaker is goal difference, then goals scored

If both of those are also equal (not impossible given current table), City win the league based on head to head games with Arsenal this season

Playoff at a neutral venue is the tiebreaker if the head to head is level (head to head includes away goals too so everything has to be perfectly level)

Don't give them ideas. EFL have now introduced quarter finals to their play offs. Surprised the PL haven't thought about play offs for the lesser European places.

But it fundamentally changes the metrics from things that were accrued over the 38 games, to a one-off game.

In other words, changes it from a league to a cup.

With all the other methods each team has the same 38 games to improve their tally, thats fair. A one off game is more subject to variance, which is less fair.

You'd swear the goal difference/goals for metrics were brought in down the home straight just as Arsenal were starting to wobble.

Maybe if they played less risk averse and put more teams to the sword when going 1-0, there wouldn't be as many squeaky bums affiliated to the Gunners right now.

Chelsea have been dining at the top table for far too long, thanks to their stolen Russian money. It'll be nice to watch them drop to a more natural level 😊

It's a start 😆

A problem with goal difference is that while it is a known potential factor from the start of the season, it only really comes into focus in late April.

Like when you scrape a horrible 1-0 home league win against a poor team on an icy & windy December day 72 hours after an away CL trip to say Quarabag, no-one suggests it as a costly mistake. The general consensus will be 'they ground it out, 3 points were all that mattered today'.

You still have 38 games to outdo your opponent, it's still a league.

If it's a complete deadlock with points, goal difference and head to head (excluding away goals) then I don't think a play off game is that bad an idea.

Deciding a league by goal difference is fine, you have 38 games to score more goals.
Deciding it by head to head when 1 team has beat the other is fine.
Deciding it by who scored more away from home against the other doesn't feel right to me.

You can still count the head to head and if they beat them over the 2 games, they win, that's fair.
If the 2 games finish 1-1 and 0-0 then I don't think it's a great tie breaker to give it to the away team in the 1-1.

Might be some confusion in thinking I was asking for it to happen all the time

Wasn't there an international tournament recently where a team was knocked out by virtue of more yellow cards received during the group phase of it?

When teams are equal on points, goal difference and H2H, it's gonna be extremely rare. I think those 3 factors should definitely come into play first. If all those 3 are equal, then I would go by total goals scored. After then potentially if those are also equal, I would go down the neutral venue play-off route.