Tottenham and Leicester saved from relegation after rule change

 

 

Arsenal under 21s 

• Can the Premier League be saved from Middle Eastern domination and control?
• The reasons why some player transfers just never work out.

By Tony Attwood

Tottenham and Leicester City have not, I hasten to add, been saved from relegation from the Premier League itself (what with Leicester down, and Tottenham sinking to eighth), but from PL2.

PL2 has been an under-23 competition but from the start of the 2022/23 season, Premier League 2 became an Under-21 competition.  The argument is that this makes it better aligned with EFL Trophy and international competitions.

However, to balance out the reduction in age, Premier League clubs will not be able to use five over-age outfield players in a game and one over-age goalkeeper in matches.

This is also something that particularly benefits Tottenham Hotspur, who not only managed to finish eighth in the Premier League despite spending 178 million euros on players last season, and who, perhaps worryingly (although maybe they didn’t notice) also managed to finish 13th out of 14 in the PL2 league.   Not quite as good as they might have hoped.

However a rule change last year means that Tottenham have managed to escape relegation – because relegation has been removed from the league, so Tottenham can carry on.  Indeed looking at events at WHL it might well be described as “quite a carry on”.

But the league table and Tottenham’s insistence on changing managers and spending money on transfers that don’t always work, put together, make a bit of a sorry state of affairs for the tiny totts.

 

		P	W	D	L	F	A	GD	Pts
C	Manchester City Under-21s	28	18	5	3	80	31	49	59
2	Liverpool Under-21s	28	13	7	6	46	29	17	46
3	Chelsea Under-21s	28	12	7	7	55	42	13	43
4	Crystal Palace Under-21s	28	11	9	6	45	42	3	42
5	Fulham Under-21s	28	11	8	7	50	39	11	41
6	Brighton & Hove Albion Under-21s	28	11	6	9	58	49	9	39
7	Arsenal Under-21s	28	8	10	8	39	40	-1	34
8	Everton Under-21s	28	9	5	12	39	51	-12	32
9	Manchester United Under-21s	28	6	12	8	46	64	-18	30
10	Blackburn Rovers Under-21s	28	9	2	15	42	52	-10	29
11	West Ham United Under-21s	28	8	4	14	39	49	-10	28
12	Wolverhampton Wanderers Under-21s	28	8	4	14	39	50	-11	28
13	Tottenham Hotspur Under-21s	28	6	10	10	34	46	-12	28
14	Leicester City Under-21s	28	4	7	15	29	57	-28	19

Indeed not only has Tottenham’s ignominy from relegation been spared but so has Leicester City’s.  On the other hand, Leeds United and Southampton who gained promotion from the second division of the league last season will be promoted.  Middlesbrough have also been added to the league.

To sort out the petty matter of who plays who it has been decided to put all the 25 teams now deemed to be in the league into five “pots” – and which “pot” one gets depends on the performance of the side over the last three years.

The teams then play each of the other teams in their “pot” and then four of the five teams in each other “pots”.     

One might suggest there is no limit to the length that Tottenham will go to, in order to arrange the avoidance of any thought of “relegation” at any level, but that would be too much as there is no evidence of skullduggery.  Although Tottenham really did come one from bottom in the league last season).

One report I read in the Athletic says, “It is unclear at this stage exactly how the fixtures will work but the plan is for clubs to face each of the other teams in their pot as well as four or five of the teams in other pots.”  Which might sound a bit potty, but there it is

The aim it seems is to give each team will play 20 games, rather than 26 games as happened in the PL2 league last season.  

But that is not all!  No, because what happens then is that the top 16 teams in the league play a set of play-offs to find out who won the league, and presumably what happened to Tottenham Hots.  The top 12 sides will then qualify for the PL International Cup. 

Now the advert for this summer’s PL International Cup reads, “From July 22-30, 2023, six clubs will compete in the first-ever Premier League Summer Series.    Five East Coast States will play host to nine matches, as Aston Villa, Brentford, Brighton & Hove Albion, Chelsea, Fulham and Newcastle United head Stateside.”

Yes, it is being played in the United States (for reasons that will not become clear at this point).

Meanwhile, in the new PL2 league, there will be no relegation largely because when relegation was an option, PL2 clubs were using first-team players to bulk out their squads to avoid the descent.

So while we used to have an under 23 league with relegation we now have an under 21 league with no relegation, with 20 games against “senior opposition”.  

Meanwhile the Papa Johns Trophy — which includes League One and League Two clubs as well as Premier League development sides — has not been well received by supporters of EFL clubs.  But it continues.

And indeed Arsenal under 21s continue to play in the trophy and are drawn for the coming season in a group against Exeter City, Reading and Swindon Town.  I believe all the games for Arsenal will be played away from home.